TMNT: Raphael: Traffic
by princessebee
Summary: What's being shipped into New York City illegally? Who are the victims in this latest crime? Raphael is going to find out, but it might not be what he thinks. Features Amber. Warnings for drug, language and sexual references. COMPLETE.
1. Chapter 1

_Hey there! Another Raph-centric story featuring my OC, Amber. Thanks to anyone who reads these stories, I really hope that you are enjoying them, and thanks for giving fanfiction with an OC a chance... it means a lot. _

_I have at least another three stories planned that have Amber involved, one that's a one-shot and the other two multi-chaptered, but we'll see how we go. _

_I also have a couple of other Turtle stories in the draft stages of plot-planning, but I really like to write just one tale at a time, so stay tuned. _

_I would like to send out a heartfelt plea for reviews. I know many people read but don't review and I try not to be too much of a review-whore, but it really does help. It won't stop me from writing not to get them, but it strokes my ego and makes me feel good other people are enjoying the tales. So please… even if it's only a one-liner, make a comment… thank you!_

_Enjoy!_

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**CHAPTER ONE**

**I**

It's a beautiful night.

The moon is full, a gun shot wound in the sky leakin' silvery light all over the inky water. The sky is indigo, clear without a cloud to blemish it. Down here on these docks the sounds of the city are faint, like whispers murmured into the breeze. The gentle lapping sounds of the water are like a lullaby, hypnotic and sweet in the dark. You can almost make believe there's nothin' but you, the water and the moon, at the end of the world.

It sure is a beautiful night.

Perfect for bustin' skulls.

They don't even know what hits 'em.

My _manriki_ snakes out, cracking against one mug's skull. He goes down without a noise and as his pal turns around, eyes boggling, it lashes back, connecting with his jaw. There's a pop as it dislocates and he's out too, pistols clattering uselessly beside them.

I move forward, masked by shadows, towards the end of the dock where the rest of the gang is doing business with the importer in front of the boat, which hulks over them like a great silent beast, obscuring them from view. I can make out dark silhouettes, one small and bent at the shoulders, one tall and lean, the last guy squat and stocky. I see the bright orange end of a cigarette moving up and down in the air as they quietly discuss the transaction in another language – Thai, I think. There's the sound of money rustling, changing hands. The voices rise, the scratch of heels on hard ground. They're stepping towards the boat.

Sorry fellas. You're not gonna get to unload this merchandise.

They have guns. So I gotta be quick.

The _manriki_ swings out, disarms the squat one. He yelps and grips his smarting hand, bent double as the other two gasp, whirl around. The little one leaps back; he's unarmed and quivering, stumbling back towards the boat.

I wait. Hidden in the shadows. The tall one steps forward, cocks his gun, aims it in front of him. I decide to make this one a close dance.

I wonder what he sees as I leap out of the darkness, hitting him full force in the chest, knocking him backwards. His arm whips up, the gun goes off with a cracking sound, shooting harmlessly into the sky. He hits the dock, me on top, wheezing. I pull him to his feet, fist to the gut, other to the jaw and he goes down. There's no struggle.

The squat one is still whimpering. I know his hand must be broken in a half dozen places. I decide not to risk it though and let his pained yelps lead me to him in the darkness.

Moments later I walk the gangplank, after the importer who's retreated there.

He comes at me from the right, some sorta pipe raised in his arms. I catch it midair, rip it from his grip. He's old but desperation makes him fierce. He wrests away from me, ducks with surprising swiftness, falls onto his haunches and backs up, hands scrabbling against the deck.

"Okay, okay," he entreats in halting English. "You take them! You! Take! You can have! They be good. They make much happy time. You enjoy."

_What?_

I reach forward and grasp him by his beaten leather jacket, hauling him to his feet.

"What kinda drugs you got on here, creepy?"

He shakes his head violently, hands raised. "Is good! Is good! You take! Gift! They work hard!"

A tap with the back of my fist shuts him up.

He crumples to a heap on the deck and I walk to the cargo hold, curious. The double doors are unlocked and I swing them back, before descending, touching the sides of the helmet to switch on the twin flashlights there.

The women scream as the double circles of light sweep over them, cowering back against the wall, amongst the crates, clinging to each other as I approach them. There's six of them, young, pretty Asian women, rumpled and dirty from their long voyage, in cheap Thai dresses and pants. For a moment I don't quite comprehend what it is I'm seein', then all of a sudden it hits me in a rush as they continue to shriek and grasp at each other in sheer desperate terror.

_Holy shit…_

**II**

_**NIGHTWATCHER VIGILANTE HALTS SHIPMENT OF TRAFFICKED WOMEN BROUGHT INTO NYC TO BE SOLD INTO SEX SLAVERY!**_

Amber snorted at the headline and tried to disdainfully bunch the newspaper into a ball. It was too thick and her shaking hands too weak; instead she ended up folding it over and over and jamming it into the wastebin by the door at Thistleways before turning to say goodbye to the night staff just starting their shift. Gary smiled and waved and she gave him a lopsided grin.

Outside the sky overhead was darkening, the last bright rays of the sun winking between the gaps of the buildings as she ran down the steps onto the street, lighting a cigarette. The summer evening was warm and humid and the city was buzzing as people finished their day of work and set about enjoying their night.

At the sound of a motor gunning, her head whipped up and she grinned. The silver bike hovered at the corner of Thistleway Avenue and Thistleway Lane, its familiar suited and hooded rider astride it and looking straight at her, big hands gripping the handlebars, one boot balancing against the asphalt. She picked up her pace, watched her pale reflection bob up and down in the mirrored visor of his helmet, swung one leg over the bike behind him and wrapped her arms about his waist as he hit the pedal and revved off.

He parked in a small laneway a couple of blocks from the river, lifted her onto the fire escape and followed behind her. When she had to pause to catch her breath half-way up, he slung her easily across his shoulders and kept climbing.

"You're such a show-off" she muttered dryly and thought perhaps she felt the vibration of a chuckle through his body as he continued to smoothly, quickly ascend. She'd quickly gotten used to being manhandled as he pursued the objective he wanted. He didn't like to wait.

They reached the rooftop. The building was a tall one, towering over the others that stretched out before them, affording a clear, unobstructed view of the river, glittering now in the moonlight. They went up there often. A sagging, weather-damaged old couch sat there with a rickety old coffee table, left there by a resident from below. The couch was grimy and smelled of mould, but it was always quiet up there, and the view was perfect.

He put her down and she let one hand linger on his shoulder a moment before moving away. Only then did he remove his helmet, the swish of the padding against his flesh, wiping his forehead with the back of one gloved hand.

"Can't imagine that's the coolest getup to move around in," she remarked, moving towards the couch and fishing in her knapsack for a bottle of booze.

"I manage." He replied shortly.

"Why don't you take it off?" She suggested and he flinched. She knew why. Knew he was still not wholly comfortable with her seeing him – all of him – as he really was. She wanted to force it. "Come on. It's just us up here and you look like you're cookin' in that thing."

He hesitated another moment, then abruptly stood, peeling off the gloves, kicking off the boots, undoing the long zip down the front of the suit and shrugging it off his shoulders, muscular arms flexing as he removed the whole thing. Then he came and slumped beside her.

"How you doing, Raphael?" She glanced at him from the corner of her eyes as she lifted the bottle to her lips. His brows were furrowed, his pebbled skin dark and shadowy in the dim light. The ties of the red mask dangled over his shoulder and his wide, large mouth was set. She'd almost gotten used to the way he looked.

He turned towards her and finally smiled. "Real good. What about you, Amber? Hows the dayjob goin'?"

She beamed then, passing him the bottle. "You know, it's great. It really is. Today I held a workshop on safe injecting techniques and a whole bunch of folks showed up, like, six people which is huge, including a couple of newbies. They weren't all street workers either, couple of escorts. Word got out. They were really keen. Knew a lot. We all shared what we knew then had this, like, impromptu discussion on negotiating when a client wants to pay you in gear instead of cash, had a couple of bottles of wine and some food. Yeah, I ate."

Raphael's eyeridges were quirked up, his lips twisted in a funny smile. He was still getting used to this Amber, the Amber who grinned and chatted cheerfully about her day, who wore clothes almost approaching respectability, although they were still taken from the kid's section at the Goodwill. Today it was a tank top emblazoned with the wisdom: "Boys Stink" and a Rainbow Brite skirt. She continued, pulling out another cigarette:

"Real cute boywhore showed up, I'm tellin' you, just beautiful. Hispanic. Beautiful arms. Big, pouty lips. We shared a taste afterwards, had a laugh. He was gorgeous."

He gritted his teeth at that, couldn't help himself. She recited the information matter-of-factly, unaware of his tensing posture, staring out over the river with pinned pupils, head lolling to one side. Abruptly she straightened, turned her gaze to his.

"Saw you were a real hero last night."

He snorted, shrugged. "Thought it was just a regular drug shipment. I coulda been sick when I saw…" The memory of it welled up in him again, the frightened, screaming women… it was too cowardly to beat up on the old man, but it had been close… real close.

She looked down at her knees, hesitated a moment then said: "You know… it's not always what it looks like, you know."

He felt a spark of irritation. "What else was it then?"

She took the bottle back from him, had another swig, shook her head. "I'm gettin' so damn sick of this country's Orientalism."

"You've lost me."

"Never mind. It's good to see you."

"You too."

They sat in silence for a while, listening to the sturm and drang of the city, watching the water undulate black and silver in the river before them.

His nearness at once unnerved and soothed her. He shifted, leaned back against the cushions and his arm brushed hers. She felt the muscle there and shivered. His presence loomed; it always did, heavy against her. She moved restlessly, uncomfortable with his intensity, and her knee slid against his thigh, his taut and hard against the limp, thin softness of hers. They both froze, stiff and tense on the smelly old sofa on the rooftop twenty stories above the street, concertedly not looking at each other.

She took another drink to mask her discomfort, handed the bottle to him without looking. He took it and, true to the awkwardness of the night thus far, his uncommonly large fingers brushed the back of her hand, the flesh on them smooth, warm and textured, unlike the hand of any man she'd touched before. _Just no winning. _

"So, uh," his voice came out strained and he cleared his throat before continuing. "You not workin' tonight then?"

She shook her head. "Nope. Thistleways gig is two days a week. I work them, sleep the night inbetween then stay up the whole night on the second day – which was today – so I can sleep during the day tomorrow. Then I'm ready to work by nightfall. " She could be working – but she wanted to hang out with Raphael instead.

"You sleep a night?" Humour had returned to his voice. "Watch out. You'll become a normal person if you're not careful."

She scoffed dismissively. "You'll join me the day it happens, '_Nightwatcher'_."

"Hey, I didn't come up with the name. Tell ya the truth, I'd rather have remained nameless – seems more… I dunno… threatenin' somehow. But you know what the media is like." He lifted his hands, palms up and she nodded.

"I know, baby. I know. _Drug-addicted prostitutes live lives of degradation and violence! Is there no hope for these desperate women?"_ She spoke with sardony, flicking her hair back and sneering.

She turned her head to look at him; his gaze was fixed upon her and unexpectedly their eyes locked. She couldn't drag hers away. His eyes were so deep and dark, their colour a rich brown that seemed always to be clouded. No, not that – but darkly smouldering as though lit deep within.

He snapped his gaze away, stood up and strode from her, swinging his arms back and forth. "So uh – hows business been?"

"Brisk. Always is, in summer." She had a chance to examine him now. She'd done it already, so many times, but he never ceased to fascinate her; the hard, bulky muscle of his arms and legs, the scarred, bone-plated armour across his chest, the intricately patterned and also scarred surface of the shell on his back. _Plastron. Carapace._ He'd told her the words. She formed them with her lips, silently, running her eyes once again over his arms as he lifted one to scratch the back of his neck. They were scarred too. She couldn't quite recall if his brothers hard borne scars like he did. So much of those two weeks had been a blur.

"You must be happy." He hadn't turned to look back at her, his body turned towards the river, his flesh softly illuminated silver in the moonlight. Their conversation tonight was stilted, awkward.

She shrugged, reached for the bottle of liquor again. "Sure makes the night go faster. Plus gear is at the best quality it's been for a while. I been buyin' extra, for when it dries up again." She could see him tensing, his shoulders drawing up just a little. She knew he hated to hear about it, but she didn't give a damn. She wouldn't pretend.

He seemed determined not to face her so she pushed herself off the couch on unsteady arms and ambled over to come around in front of him. He continued to gaze out over her head and she ran her eyes over him again, openly, down to the place where his thighs disappeared into the armour. She wondered, not for the first time, exactly what his secrets were down there. That he was male was inarguable – if it wasn't the voice, deep and brusque, or the shape of the muscle, then the machismo was a dead giveaway. She reached an arm out, fingertips brushing the edge of his shell by his side, turning inwards to stroke just beneath the ridge.

He jumped, violently, taking several steps away from her and looking at her with wild alarm.

"What are you doing?" There was a curious panic in his voice and she felt her heartbeat rise.

"I'm sorry – did I hurt you?" she still wasn't sure of all the rules and anxiously stepped towards him, concerned she'd scratched a sensitive spot. He took another step back, one arm crossing over his plastron to reach around and cover the place she'd touched. Unusually, he was not rageful, but nervous, edgily moving beyond her reach.

"No – no – it just felt – " He turned from her savagely once more and strode back to the discarded Nightwatcher suit. "I'm gonna put this back on. Someone might come up." She knew it wasn't likely but knew also there was no point arguing with him. Too quickly that panic would turn into fury, the way all his emotions did when he didn't understand them. She sidled back to the couch, fumbling in her knapsack for cigarettes as he redressed, covering his reptilian form in the full-body disguise. He lifted the helmet up, hesitated, partly turned away from her. "I better go," he said quietly over his shoulder and she swallowed against the bitter rise of disappointment in her throat. She thought they might have the evening to hang out, but damned if she was going to plead with him. If she was honest with herself, she could've acknowledged how much she wanted to hang out with him that night. Amber was often honest with herself – honest when she needed a fix, honest when she was out for cash however it took, honest that she avoided phoning her parents back in Jersey. But honesty now would be way too distracting, after all these years. It wouldn't serve her and Amber was nothing if not self-serving.

So instead she lit up, drew in and blew out, up towards the sky.

"Yeah, okay baby," her drawl so nonchalant it seemed an effort for the words to leave the cushiony confines of her mouth. "I might work after all. Give me a ride back, be a sweetheart then."

**III**

"Prostitution degrades the soul and the body. The prostituted woman's spirit is slowly eroded, day in and day out until she is no more than a shell, a receptacle for the abuse and exploitation of her clients."

The lady who spoke these hard words had wide, slightly crazed eyes, the kind you only find on a fanatic. Her face was drawn downwards around the eyes and mouth, thin lines running like cracks down her features.

I'd been flickin' through the stations idly. It was early mornin', and I was comin' off the adrenalin high of the evenin', too abuzz to contemplate sleep yet. The memory of Amber's strokin' fingers along my shell was still vivid, the recollection of the sensation powerful enough to make me shiver. It kept coming back in flashes, inconveniently as I was smashing someone's face in. As I'd clicked onto this channel, the footage showing was of a New York City street and a couple of street walkers, the camera zooming in on them as they chatted and laughed, cigarettes dangling from their hands, clearly unaware they were bein' recorded.

"The prostituted woman has no way of assessing her degraded state. She is so oppressed she is not even aware that she is oppressed. Drug abuse, mental illness and suicide are common afflictions of the prostituted woman. Often she comes from a background of sexual abuse and violence. Men who use prostituted women are more likely to be sexually violent, aggressive and abusive. They are incapable of viewing the women they exploit as even human."

I was sittin' on the sofa, alone. The rest of the lair was silent; the others all still in bed. It was Friday, our one day of rest and the sleep-in was always taken advantage of, even by Master Splinter. With Ol' Fearless somewhere across the sea, there wasn't even any meditatin' happening. The early morning news was runnin' this story and I was hunched forward, arms resting across my knees, watching the screen intently. The footage cut from this woman – whoever she was – to images of the streets, in bold, stark colour. Nothin' explicit – too early in the day for that – but I'll bet it was shocking enough for middle-class suburban families.

"Project Dignity," the woman was back on. "is an exit program designed for women who wish to escape the horrendous trap of the sex industry. We at Project Dignity understand that prostitution is never a choice and aim to restore dignity and respectable employment and lifestyles to the women who have been so damaged by prostitution. Of course many of these women can never recover fully, due to their awful experiences in prostitution. But with Project Dignity's help, they can begin a normal life."

I yawned, scratched, let out a sigh. I wondered what Amber would have to say about this and the thought made me chuckle. I could just imagine it.

The woman's face became ever more pinched – like she was suckin' on a lemon – as she took another direction.

"But even worse than a woman becoming a prostitute to support a drug habit or because of the countless years of abuse she suffered, is for a woman to be forced into it without her knowledge. Here in America we are seeing an alarming rise in the number of women smuggled into the country to be sold into sex slavery."

The screen flickered and the footage changed again, this time panning over the faces of pale, anxious looking Asian women, clustered together in a big bare room. They reminded me of the women the other night and I sat up straight again, leaning even further forward.

"Asian women are the most popular, as they are so small and docile and are easily tricked into believing they are coming to America to work in hospitality. Once here, their passports are taken, all personal items are confiscated and they are locked into a brothel to work countless hours, seven days a week. They are not permitted to go outside or to have any contact with their families. They are kept in a state of undress and chained to their beds. They are made to have sex with man after man, often forced to complete gross, degrading sexual acts without condoms. Sometimes they will see as many as fifteen men in a night! After that many clients, your mind breaks down, your body breaks down, you lose your dignity and your self-worth."

I felt anger burbling deep in my chest, a spark ignited and slowly rising, rushing along my blood stream and lighting blossoming branches of veins, rising up high and higher until it reached my throat, raced upwards, bursting into flame somewhere behind my eyes.

The camera angle changed, now on a little Asian girl crying, her face in her hands.

"This girl thought she would start a new life in America and be able to bring her family over to join her. Imagine her shock and horror when she arrived only to be beaten, raped and forced into sexual slavery. She is just one of the many such women that Project Dignity have rescued."

Once again the footage switched, now the camera bobbed up and down violently, as though the operator were running, following a group of hooded people brandishing planks of wood, rushing through a small, dark corridor and bursting into a tiny, dim-lit room to the alarmed shrieks and screams of the room's occupants. I could see they were Asian women, half-dressed and terrified. The hooded people grabbed them, tore back out of the room and down the corridor, followed all the while by the jerking camera. The woman's voice continued over the top:

"Project Dignity has staged many such rescues. As a team we storm the underground brothels, grabbing the women and retreating before the pimps have time to realise what we do. After that we bring the women back to our headquarters where they are bathed and fed and offered free counselling."

Once again the camera panned over that large bare room and the shocked, frightened faces of the Asian girls, numbly holding mugs in their hands and blinking confusedly at the camera, some clinging to each other's hands and talking hysterically in their language, the sounds of it a garbled stream of nonsense to my ears.

"After that we train them in skills that will be of use to them back in their home countries, such as basket weaving, sewing, cleaning and cooking. This way they can return home with skills that will enable them to be properly employed."

The woman's face appeared again, huge and filling the screen. One of her front teeth was chipped. Her hair was slate grey and cut in a choppy, unflattering style. I watched, utterly still and fixated, my hands balled into fists and my teeth clenched.

"Please – if you see or suspect there may be a sex slave operation happening in your neighbourhood – phone us to report it. Help save these women and give them back their lives."

The camera stayed fixed on the lady's face a moment longer as she pressed her lips tightly together, then flashed to a screen displaying the number and address of their New York branch. My eyes flickered across it, barely registering, before I suddenly relaxed with a hiss, my fists loosening, my hands feeling cramped from the depth of tension I'd held. My jaw unlocked, and I rolled its hinges, thrusting the remote towards the TV and jamming the power button savagely to turn the damn thing off.

Again the faces of those women flashed behind my eyes and I felt a surge through my body, wishin' I had beaten that old guy's face in after all. But he was the least of my worries. Someone was askin' for these women to be delivered into NYC. Someone was providin' the cash to the importers. Someone was takin' these women's freedom and dignity away. Someone was at the head of this sick, revoltin' game.

And I was gonna find out who.


	2. Chapter 2

**CHAPTER TWO**

**IV**

"FUCK YOU, you condescending, misogynistic, patronising, mother fucking, cock sucking DICKHEADS!"

Ah yes. Another pleasant evenin' on Redfern Street.

"How the fuck dare you try and tell me I'm incapable of makin' a choice! Who the fuck are you? Huh? What do you know about my life? How the fuck dare you treat me like I'm stupid, or helpless!"

The two women from Project Dignity who'd approached Amber were backing away quickly, alarm etched on their features like a bundle of dynamite had just exploded in their faces.

Which I guess it had.

Amber had reached a fever pitch of fury such that she screamed once, loud and shrill, grabbed the Styrofoam cups from their hands – the ones filled with weak tea they were handin' out to the street girls – and threw them violently to the pavement, letting loose with a stream of expletives that would've been hilarious if it weren't so goddamned disconcerting:

"Fuckfuckfuckfuckfuckfuckfuckingcuntfuckingcockbitchfuckfuck fuck YOU!"

And she launched herself towards them on the final word, head pointed at them like an arrow, balled fists punching backwards as if to help her propel through the air, teeth bared, eyes wild, and snarling.

The women ran. They dropped their bag of flyers and high-tailed it, not darin' even to glance behind them. They ran from an eighty-five pound hooker wearin' kids' clothes and who, five minutes ago, had been dancin' and singin' along to '_ABC_' by the Jackson Five.

Lenny of Vintage Vinyl leaned up against his store window and roared with laughter, clutching his great round belly, Stetson hat pushed up high on his head. I'd pulled up a few feet from her and was watchin' silently, secure behind the helmet.

"Can you believe this SHIT?" she hissed, brandishing a flyer at me. "Prostitutes were ALL abused as children, prostitutes ALL have drug problems, prostitutes ALL have pimps. Do you know how many girls I've known in the last ten years who've had pimps?" she shrieks at me, but without waiting for a response continues in a roar: "NONE!"

She began tearing up the flyers, hissing and spitting, great clumps of coloured paper goin' flying. Lenny continued to laugh, cars hooted and honked at her. I just sat on my bike and watched. "And I challenge you to get a group of women together, ANY women, from ANY background, and have them ALL be free of some sort of abuse or sexual assault – that's got nothin' to do with it! That's reality for women, you goddamn bitches."

People were crossing the street to avoid her. If she didn't calm down the cops would take her in. And if the cops came I'd have to disappear. Paper was fluttering around her like multi-coloured snow and she struggled hard to rip up the last bunch of flyers. The stack was too thick and she ended up throwing them to the ground where they fanned out, stomping into them with her oversized boots. "I know more hookers who are clean than who use like I do!" She was red-faced now, but the fight was going out of her, sputtering from the toes of her scuffed boots in its final exertion as she kicked at the scattered, muddied flyers. I stepped off the bike and towards her in two steps, pinned her arms to her sides and spoke low.

"Settle down. Now."

I think she tried to struggle against me, but it was a futile effort. She kicked out at me, half-heartedly, breathing in choked gasps, but I shook her and she stopped, went limp and slumped suddenly forwards, falling against my suited chest, arms limply around my waist.

I froze, my own arms suddenly supporting her, feeling the slight weight of her muffled through the suit. She pressed closer, a little moan escaping her lips, her head lolling against my shoulder as though she were exhausted. Beyond us Lenny tipped his hat.

"Oy, Nightwatcher, eh, you been watchin' my store lately or it too small for likes of you?" He heckled and I knew it was time to go. Already I'd hung around way too long. Around us the cars bipped and people slowed down as they strode the streets to take a closer look, pointing and speculating.

But Amber continued to cling to me, dead weight in my arms and I was wrestling inwardly, conflicted. Leave her, or take her with me –

"Come on, sweet cheeks," I whispered in her ear. "Stand up now," I pushed her back, trying to steady her on her trembling knees and she moaned again, raising a hand to her forehead, her eyes red and wet.

"Mother fuckers." She mumbled and I lifted a gloved hand to her cheek.

"Atta girl."

Now that she was off me I was acutely aware of how she'd felt pressed against me – small, frail and soft – and the recollection of the shivering, tickling sensation of her fingertips down my shell swelled up again. I took an abrupt step back from her.

She swayed on her feet for a moment and I reached my hands out to catch her but then, with a sharp, short shake of her head she seemed to come back to the moment, hauling her knapsack from her back to fetch a cigarette.

"They just _lie_. Shamelessly." She muttered crossly and I shrugged and moved back to my bike.

"I'll come back another night."

She blinked at me as if only just realising I was really there. "Do you think I should be rescued?"

I paused, leg half-raised to swing over the bike seat, and stared back at her, knowing I was invisible beneath the mirrored visor. Glad of it too, because I could feel I was wearin' the shock I felt like it had been painted on. I couldn't even answer.

She stood there, bony hips jutting forward, pressing against the fabric of her little dress, arms dangling by her sides and her eyes wide and staring, sunken in her plain, thin face. She waited.

I mounted the bike, gripped the handlebars tight. "Take it easy, huh. See you in a couple of nights."

She said nothing, and after a moment of blank, slack-mouthed staring, abruptly turned and headed back up towards the spot under the sign of the little bottle shop, squeezed between Lenny's and the 7-11.

I glanced down, into the muck and rubbish that choked the gutter and saw one of the Project Dignity flyers, a dirty bootprint in its middle but otherwise undamaged, fluttering there. I bent over and picked it up, scrunching it into a ball in my first. Then I gunned the motor and tore off.

**V**

The thing about the big fish is, they always make sure they got plenty of little guppies flutterin' around to take care of all the work, distract the sharks .

The three fellas I'd squished the other night were by no means the ringleaders. They were patsies for a bigger bully.

They'd taken the fall, been booked and charged but were keepin' their mouths shut.

Their bail was paid.

I guess that's why Brucie Chuan had a spring in his step as he walks jauntily down the street towards the front door of his apartment block. There's a huge, blossoming purple and black bruise decorating one half of his cheek, and he's walkin' a little stiff, but he manages to whistle a sharp little tune. I watch him ascend the steps, fumbling around in his pockets for his keys, then switching roofs, sliding down fire-escapes until I get to Brucie's window, kicking one window in, jamming it up in its frame and slipping into his dark apartment, moving through the shadows into his living room, standing opposite his front door.

A moment later there's a key in the lock and I bend a little at the knees, shoulders hunched over, ready and eager to re-introduce myself.

The door swings open, letting in a square of pale yellow light from the hall and Brucie's tall, lean silhouette falls across it. He steps in, shuts the door behind him, moves through the apartment in the darkness, moving towards the bathroom.

"Hello Brucie," my voice cuts through the dark, rasping like a knife against stone. He freezes, his head whipping up. "Remember me?"

He doesn't look towards me. He doesn't need to. A split-second later he comes back to life, makes a bolt for the door. I cover the distance between us in one bound, blocking his path. "Uh, uh, uh, Brucie. I'm back here after just one date and you not even gonna offer me a drink?"

He's reachin' into his pocket, goin' for the gun I know is there. I slam a fist into his gut and he doubles over with a strangled, startled little '_whuf_'. I grab his gun arm, twist it savagely, the momentum spinning him around so I've got him face away from me, arm pinned across his back. He whines and gasps as I push him forward, driving him hard into the wall, my other arm coming up to slam his head against the painted cement, grinding his cheek into it.

"Now, Brucie, seems you've got yourself all mixed up in the illegal entertainment business, buyin' and sellin' some real sweet merchandise. "

He sputtered, tried to struggle and I pushed his twisted arm up higher. If he pulled away, it would snap. He could tell. He stopped moving. I leaned over him closer, fingers curling in his hair and yanking his head back toward me.

"I want you to tell me who you're workin' for. Who's the asshole at the head of this kidnappin' and rapin' syndicate?"

Brucie choked, spittle spilling over the edge of his trembling lower lip, the one eye I could see bulging and swivelling in the darkness I'd grown accustomed to.

"Oh man! What! What man, it ain't what you think, it ain't like that!"

I tightened my pressure on his arm and he gave a strangled wheeze. "You tellin' me I was _imaginin'_ that cargo load of scared witless screaming girls the other night? That surely couldn't be what you're tellin' me Brucie – you gotta know by now I'm not the creative sort."

Brucie stammered, swallowed hard, his face slowly growing darker in the dimness. "I swear, man, they know what the deal is, sure they're illegals, but they're fully in the scheme, man, I swear!"

I couldn't believe this low life fucker. Couldn't believe the bullshit he was spinnin' me here – I'd _seen_ those women – seen the fear on their faces, heard their screams, smelt their terror. Why would they leave their homes and families to come fuck strangers for money in another country?

I leaned right into Brucie's face and hissed in his ear.

"That so, Brucie? If I read the reports right, those women told a real interestin' story about how they'd thought they were comin' over to work as bar staff only to be told the plans had changed half way across the ocean."

"They're lying, man, they just don't wanna get deported!"

I yanked his head back, slammed it into the cement wall, my vision momentarily obscured by the rage that tightened across my skull. "Wrong answer, sleazeball. How much lower are you prepared to go, how far you gonna test my patience? You creeps make me sick, you know that? Now a busted arm's gonna be the least what I leave you with if you don't start yappin' pretty damn quick, scumbag." I tightened the pressure just a fraction more, Brucie making a desperate, strangled yelp as I felt the muscles in his arm stretch to their absolute limit. Any further and it'd break. "Now. _Spill_."

**VI**

The terrace didn't look like much from the outside. It wasn't in bad nick, respectable even, the tall French windows on the second and third stories curtained in heavy, dark material, thin threads of light bordering them. There was no light on the front porch, and a big awning stretched across it, leaving only the front door uncovered, providin' shelter for its visitors to hide behind.

They should hide. They oughta be ashamed.

I'm not botherin' with subtlety. I cross the street, cracking my knuckles, squaring my shoulders, the cold, heavy lump of fury a dead weight in my abdomen. It's caused time to slow, the fine lines of the world springing into bright relief, stark and bold. I'm viewing the world with such clarity it almost hurts, the shiny maroon door in front of me, the flakes of paint chipping off around the knocker. Roundhouse kick once, twice and it slams back against the hallway wall, hinges leaping loose. At the end of the hall a plump white woman appears, looking alarmed.

"What do you think – " she begins, then catches sight of me, screams and runs backwards, disappearing again from view. I follow her.

There's a reception area. Cheap red velvet couches, a glass coffee table covered in cheap porn rags, a high desk with a soft red lamp squatting on it. As I approach, the phone starts ringing, shrill and piercing in the quiet. A big black diary sits next to it. The woman has retreated, ducked around the corner and up the staircase; I can hear the tread of her footsteps on the creaking old steps.

I continue to follow.

The upstairs hall is lined with rooms, the doors shut. I can hear the woman shouting as she keeps goin' higher, to the next level. "Sunan! Sunan! Trouble! Get your gun!"

So I follow her.

She's disappearing into a room at the end of the hall when I reach the third floor. The door is shutting behind her and I dart forward, pummeling towards it, crashing into it and blasting it back open. A middle-aged Thai guy with greasy hair and wearin' a wifebeater is cocking a shotgun and suddenly that cold, leaden lump of anger ignites again, flaring into white-hot fury, adrenalin ricocheting through my veins as I head straight at him, straight at the barrel of that gun.

It's close but I reach him before he squeezes the trigger. Just. I kick it out of his hands, catch movement in the corner of my eye, turn and there's another guy there, scrabbling with his own weapon, aiming it at me. I leap back just as he shoots off a round and it tears through the wall behind me, sending a shower of plaster spewing into the air. The _manriki_ flies out a split second later, connects with his hand and the weapon drops. I swing the _manriki_ again, back to the first guy, just for luck. He catches it in the side of his head and a mouthful of sweat and blood goes leaping across the room.

Then I'm up close. And real personal.

The feel of muscle and bone bending under the force of my fists is tasty. I take them at once as they rally themselves to fight me, dirty, kicking out with steel-capped boots and brass knuckles. But they're desk-goons these guys and it's easy. Too easy.

They're down, faces crumpled and blackening, blood streaking from their noses and mouths. The woman is cowering behind the desk that occupies one corner of the room, gasping in terror. I glance at her briefly, look away. The room is crammed with old grey filing cabinets, a tall set of shelves stacked with towels, boxes of condoms, lubricant and gloves piled up on the floor. On the desk is a black money box, around it stacks of cash in ordered piles. Seems I've interrupted them tallying the night's earnings.

I've been left high and dry by these guys though. Frustrated before the big finish. Denied. My heart is hammering wildly, blood pounding in my head. I want _more_.

I've left the room before I've had time to register it, hurtling back down the stairs to the second floor. One of the doors has been opened a crack and I can make out a pair of eyes peering curiously out of it in the semi-darkness. _More._ I kick the door in and the owner of the eyes lets out a yelp and leaps backwards. It's a guy, squat and fair-skinned, nothin' but a towel wrapped around his waist. He stumbles backwards as I approach him, stuttering, lifting up his hands to plead his miserable case. I'm barely aware of the half-naked Thai girl screaming on the bed behind him as I go to town.

How can they do it? How can they come here and hand over cash, knowin' these girls don't wanna be here? Do they get off on it? Is it some kind of sick power trip for them? They're no better than the scum who buy and sell these helpless women. No better than _rapists_, the whole fucking lot.

The thought wells up as a roar in my throat and I move back into the hall, down to the next room where another naked fella, this one tall and skinny, is coming out, startled by the uproar.

"What's going o_whumf_!"

I don't let him finish.

There's only the two of them. The other rooms are empty. I can hear the girls wailing in panic behind me as I kick open the last door. There's a shriek and I hit the light switch. Two girls are clinging to each other on the bed, crying with makeup runnin' all over their faces, staring at me in abject terror. They huddle closer, their long, straight black hair mingling, their eyes round and wet, wiggling as though they could climb into each other. They're whimpering, a pitiful, aching little sound and it stops me cold, sucks the rage from me in one big gasp. I hover there a moment longer, clenching my fists as I look at their slender, bare brown limbs and too-young faces; then turn and head back down the hall, the stairs, down to the reception room again. I reach into the backpack, pull out the crumbled paper ball and unfold it, the residual tremors of my passion making my hands shake, so the flyer tears a little. I pick up the receiver on the phone and dial the number. It rings twice before it's answered:

"Project Dignity, how can I help you?"

"133b Old Kent Road." I said brusquely, my breath short but heavy. "Think you lot will be very interested in what's for sale here."

I replaced the receiver in the cradle and strode towards the front door, grim and far from satisfied.

Let this be my calling card to the big fish. Now he knows I'm after him.


	3. Chapter 3

**CHAPTER THREE**

**VII**

"It's not really my job to do this – but you'll need these."

Amber was filling a paper bag full of condoms and sachets of lubricant from the boxes stacked behind the front desk of Thistleways. Both the reception staff were occupied dealing with other drop-ins and Amber had been strolling back to her desk in the back offices from the bathroom when she'd noticed the shy and uncertain looking Thai woman hovering at the front desk.

Intuition told her the woman was a working girl and she couldn't ignore a sister. The woman didn't speak a great deal of English but through some dumb mime and stick drawings the two women managed to communicate.

The woman had nowhere to work and wanted to know where she might try the streets and find some accommodation. Amber bent down over the desk and wrote the hot spots out and got the woman to practice saying them until she was satisfied. The multi-cultural worker, Jun, wasn't in until the next day but there were pamphlets printed in Thai behind the desk that Amber slipped into the paper bag. After a moment's thought she wrote down her name and the location she worked.

"Redfern Street, near Twelfth." She spoke clearly to the woman who knitted her brows together, dark eyes unsure. "Outside a record store. You can find me. Amber. Okay?"

After repeating this, the woman's eyes cleared and she nodded. "Okay. You Amber."

"That's it." She smiled at the woman who smiled back at her and inclined her head.

"Thank you." She sang. "Vewry much." Her eyes fell upon the newspapers stacked on the edge of the desk next to the straggling pot plant someone had tried to brighten the area with. The front page news was a Nightwatcher story, the elusive vigilante photographed in silhouette, poised on his bike about to tear away from a neatly tied pair of armed robbers. Seeing the image, the woman gasped and tapped it on it with a fingernail.

"He bad man!"

Amber chuckled. A lot of people responded to Raphael and his actions like that – and to this woman, foreign to the city, he probably looked like a criminal, one of the thieves running from the scene of the crime. She shook her head and picked up the paper, holding it up.

"No. Good. Nightwatcher."

The woman looked puzzled again, a little crease between her brows. "Bad man! Ah – " she said a few words in Thai, and it was Amber's turn to be puzzled, shaking her head to indicate she didn't understand. The woman rolled her eyes back in her head and roared, making her hands into claws.

"Ooh, you think he's like a monster – scary huh?" Amber smiled. "Yeah he's scary but he's a good guy. He's a protector. Do you know what that is?"

The woman blinked liquid chocolate eyes, her full pink lips slack. Amber grabbed a piece of paper and began to draw.

"You see, there's us," she drew a hasty sketch of a woman in a short skirt and high heels, "and here's a bad guy," she depicted him with an evil grin and a gun in his hand, pointing it at the doodle of the woman. "He's going to try and hurt us" she pointed from the bad guy to the prostitute. "See? You understand?" The woman nodded slowly and Amber kept drawing. "But here comes Nightwatcher," She did a passable rendition of Raphael's helmet and bulky body. "And he beats up the bad guy and helps us out." She put a club in Nightwatcher's hands, coming down on the bad guys head. "See?" She quickly drew another picture, of the prostitute and Nightwatcher standing side by side, hands held. She paused, wondering if she was being clear enough, then drew a misshapen heart above them. "Nightwatcher – friend."

"Ahhhh!" the woman exclaimed, her eyes brightening. "Friend. Like Uncle."

Amber shrugged. "Sure. He's a good guy."

After the woman left Amber set about stacking up the papers and flyers that littered the desk for people to pick up, sighing as she did. She was just beginning to feel the crawling weight of need, heavying her shoulders, a prickle in her temples that would soon flare into an ache. She'd go back to the injecting room soon and take care of it. She glanced down at the Nightwatcher headline once more and snorted, strands of hair lifting in the force of the exhalation. She had not seen Raphael for a week, not since he'd freaked out on the rooftop. She'd already figured by then she hadn't hurt him by touching him – that it must've been the exact opposite – and that was why he'd high-tailed it, more like a scared teenager than a fearless vigilante.

She traced his outline in the photograph with one jagged fingernail, unable to help the small smile that crept one side of her face. She recalled their hands brushing, the solid, hard feel of his arm muscles beneath her fingertips and a blossoming warmth spread out in her belly, rushing upwards, colouring her cheeks. Snickering at herself she dropped her face into her hands and shook her head. Her last relationship had been almost four years ago and born more of need and necessity than any real passion other than a brief flare of lust when they'd met at the home of a mutual friend one early morning, all of them preparing to shoot up and fade out for the day together. They'd spent the day fucking in the lazy, delirious way being high always inspired. Then, because they both had a habit and therefore similar priorities, they kind of just kept hanging out. Amber moved in, sleeping somewhere other than Eva's or the bus station for a change. In the end, she grew resentful of scoring for two people, sharing her contact – Eva consistently had high quality gear, not the badly cut stuff that dominated the streets in down seasons – and her substantially higher earnings and had walked out one day, without a word or a note, returning to the streets.

And since then she'd stopped caring.

But increasingly she was getting this delicious, spreading warmth when she thought of Raphael, and though it was as perturbing as it was enjoyable, she wasn't spending a lot of time analysing it too closely. He was funny – how seriously, how passionately he took things, how easily he flew off the handle, his ferocious convictions and determination to see them through. The way he worried about her without worrying. He'd seen her at her ugliest, her most wretched and yet he hadn't been repulsed – hadn't given up on her.

And, as much as he hated her drug addiction, he never pushed her on it.

By this time in her life Amber had abandoned or alienated most of her friends. Raphael was about the best friend she had.

When he was in the suit, helmet on, it was easy to forget he wasn't human. That he was an extraordinary man, brave and loyal who just happened to like donning a suit of armour and rampaging amongst the city's crooks.

It was easy to acknowledge what that tingling heat fluttering through her meant.

When she was confronted with the reality of what he was – what it meant – she found it was easier then to not think about it. Several times her thoughts had tried wandering down that path only for her to recoil from them – it seemed incomprehensible. Impossible.

And apart from anything else, Amber already knew – strung out, thin, plain and riddled with a virus – that she was not exactly the stuff of fantasy, except for a few particular sorts of fetishists.

With a start she came back to herself, her quivering hands folded over the top of the paper, blinking rapidly to clear her bleary gaze. There was a dull throbbing in her head. Annoyed at herself she swiped the paper away, sneering. Beneath it a bright orange flyer sat, bold black print declaring:

_Are YOU a VICTIM of the SEX INDUSTRY?_

_PROJECT DIGNITY is here for YOU!_

_You can drop in anytime at our head office. We provide support, counselling, short term accommodation, skills training and referrals._

_WE CAN HELP YOU REBUILD YOUR LIFE_

_Remember: entering the sex industry is not a choice –_

_BUT LEAVING IT CAN BE!_

She crushed it in her hand, teeth bared and clenching together. There were so many things wrong with it she didn't even know where to start. PONY, the Prostitutes of New York organization, had already had several meetings on the best way they were going to tackle the situation – damage control of the misinformation or outright lies being spread. The public lapped it up of course – sex scandals always sold and people loved the concept of the reluctant, downtrodden whore, because it reaffirmed everything they already believed. The truth was too confronting for them – too much of a challenge to their sex-phobic, essentially misogynistic mentality.

She dropped the crushed flyer into the wastepaper bin and after hesitating a moment sent the newspaper sweeping in after it.

To hell with it all. Time to fix.

**VIII**

I was feelin' pretty good, all things considered.

Though I still hadn't got to the bottom of the traffickin' deal, I was well on the way and had already got satisfaction – of a sort.

I wouldn't say I got fixated – but I did find it hard to let somethin' go once it had got in my head. Already I hadn't gone back to the lair for a couple of days – which I knew would be driving the others nuts – but I had to see this through.

I'd feel it, like venom in my veins, pounding hot and loud, demanding all my attention, all my drive. I'd be in its fever grip until I saw every last one of these scumsuckers down – whatever it took.

I wasn't doin' much, just riding around the streets, giving myself time to think about where to go next. Takin' it slow and easy, the bike rumbling beneath me reassuringly, the heat of it and the weight like an old friend, keeping me steady. Moving around the streets always cleared my head and helped me focus. Sittin' still wasn't my style – meditatin' felt like a terrific waste of time mostly, making me itch all the more to move – to _do _something. Even if it was just puttering idly along the street – hey you never know what you might see.

I'd pulled up at the lights at the corner of Fifth and Forest, still the rough side of town. While I waited for the green I checked out the girl hanging around on the corner across the other side. She was new, but there were new girls all the time. Some vanished as quickly as they'd appeared, unable to handle the lifestyle, or moving on to an agency. But there was somethin' about this girl that seemed – familiar.

She was Asian, petite and pretty with brutally curled and lacquered hair and deep plum lips. Dressed in a short purple dress, she comfortably sauntered back and forth on the corner, made all the more conspicuous by the high heels she was wearin'. Girls learned pretty quick high heels weren't the best choice for standing around in hours on end. Sneakers and boots were the foot wear of choice for any working girl worth her salt.

She tossed her hair over one shoulder and lifted her face up to the sky and then it hit me. Where I'd seen her before.

She was one of the girls from the brothel the other night.

The lights changed and I gunned the motor, roaring over to where she stood, pulling up sharply. I shoulda known – savin' them wouldn't be that easy. Maybe one of the creeps had sent her out here, maybe she just didn't know where else to go – maybe she thought she didn't have a choice.

Damnit.

She gasped and took a step back when she saw me, then started batting at the air towards me with her purse, speaking rapidly in Thai – which considering the last time I'd not been on my best behaviour wasn't so odd. I held my hands out to show I meant no harm and spoke in as soothing voice as I could muster, it still sounding like rusty nails to my ears.

"It's okay – I'm not gonna hurt you – I'm a good guy."

"Scht! Scht!" she hissed and I felt desperation rise. Funnily enough she didn't sound that scared – more like she was tellin' me off.

"I was tryin' to get you out of a bad situation – believe me, I wouldn't hurt you or any of your friends," I knew she couldn't understand me but I was hopeful somethin' would get through. "Why don't you let me take you someplace safe?"

As I spoke she'd stopped hissing at me and was staring at me with round eyes, a little pout on her mouth.

"You Uncle?" she said in her shrill, accented voice. "Nahtwater yes?"

"Uuhh…" Uncle? "Sure… I'm the Nightwatcher… "

"You wan' boom boom?" she suddenly was smiling, standing with one hip jutted and angling towards me. "We make happy. Fifty dowra, okay for you?"

Oh man.

"No, I'm sayin' I'll take you somewhere they can help you… get you off the streets," I tried to explain again, knowing it was hopeless, and she giggled ostentatiously as though I'd made a great joke.

"Okay Mister Uncle, we go, we make happy."

_Jeez…_ I gave up and indicated the seat behind me. "Come on, honey. Hop on."

Ten minutes later I was pulling up in front of Project Dignity's head office. A big converted town house with large bay windows covered in white drapes, soft illumination behind them. Someone was home, at least.

I helped the girl off the bike and she squealed when she saw the house. "Ayiii – nice, nice!"

She slipped her arm into mine and I tried not to think of the weirdness of the situation – me a giant turtle in a silver jumpsuit leading an illegally immigrated hooker to a refuge.

After ringing the bell, it wasn't a long wait before somebody answered the door, a middle-aged woman with long grey hair and a rumpled face who took one look at me and shrieked, moving to slam the door shut.

"Hey! Hang on there!" I slammed an arm into the doorframe, knocking the door back. Why did everyone always think I was out to cause trouble? "I've got a girl here for ya. She's from the brothel bust the other night – found her workin' on the streets. Thought you could help her out."

The woman gaped at me and then noticed the girl for the first time, exclaiming in dismay.

"Oh you poor dear!" The girl had been looking very confused by our exchange, a puzzled little frown on her features, and when the woman reached out to grasp her by the arm and draw her in she started shaking her head violently.

"Hundred dowra now, okay? Fifty no good. Hundred."

"Thank you," the woman said to me firmly and pushed on the door again. This time I let her, removing my arm and getting a face full of door for the trouble. It shut with a crisp and final sound and inside I could hear the woman speaking in Thai, the voice fading as the two moved down the corridor.

I hovered there a moment longer, feeling inexplicably uneasy, before turning to go back to my bike.

**IX**

The light from the neon sign was in Amber's hair. It shone there, silvery-gold and I stared at it. Then she tossed her head and kept moving and the effect was broken. She was walking back from a job and I followed, negotiating the rooftops above, waiting until she reached a more secluded area before I made myself known – I'd retired the suit for the night.

She was singing under her breath, her head jerking up and down to the melody, long hair swaying softly on the beat of her steps. I could see she'd not long shot up – there was a strange heaviness to her body as though she moved underwater, a vivid calm on her face, it caught the eye. She'd long ago lost all the weight she'd gained staying with us and her skin was paper-thin, orange freckles bright against it. There was a curious translucence to her lately, something that made her all the stranger and more fragile. I thought it might have to do with the virus she had. She never spoke of it though I think she'd sought treatment. It made me feel strange and twisted inside, the desire to protect her like a clenched fist in my gut. I'd felt it before – always did when someone close to the clan who couldn't easily defend themself was vulnerable – April, and Angel. It's just it didn't happen all that often. They took care of themselves.

But with Amber – it was startin' to happen one time too many.

I dropped down onto a low rooftop and whistled to her. She started, but otherwise did not acknowledge me, instead ducking down a small laneway between two buildings. I climbed up and darted forward over the roofs to the place where she waited.

"Join me in the park." I hissed down to her upturned face, dark shadows sloping heavily over it, and she shrugged, turning on her heel.

I found her walking along a curving pathway, the park as silent and still as a graveyard, the grass and trees blue-black in the dark. I fell into step with her and she half-smiled, keeping her eyes down on the path in front of us. The night was warm, soft and sweetly scented by the surrounding foliage. We said nothing for a long while. Eventually she turned off the path, walking across the grass and I followed. She found a spot that seemed to suit beneath a heavy, stretched out tree, and flopped down, legs lolling in front of her.

"Been a while." She stated, tapping out a cigarette.

"Only a week." I rejoined and she shrugged again, exhaling into the night. In the darkness she was barely visible, not much more than the point of her cigarette, burning hot orange, throwing a dim glow over her face, streaked and spattered by the overhang of the tree branches, shifting barely in the breeze.

"I've been takin' care of some stuff." I offered in explanation, though I didn't think I owed her one.

Her lips twisted with sardony: "Oh yes? Delivering poor trafficked women from their miserable fate?" There was something mean in her voice and I bridled.

"I s'pose you think I shoulda just looked the other way?" I snipped and she glared at me, blowing lungfuls of smoke into the warm, dark night.

"I think you shoulda been certain of all your facts before you went on a crusade." She spoke plainly and with a sneer and I scowled back at her, hands tightening around my belt, feeling tension run like a flare through my shoulders. We glared at each other in open hostility for a few moments, two shadows with faintly shining eyes, before she sighed and ashed her cigarette.

"Forget it. Hows things back home?"

I relented and slumped down next to her, one leg bent at the knee, the other stretched out in front of me. "The same. Donnie's doin' a poor impersonation of Leo and makin' all the same mistakes and Mikey has his eyes shut with his fingers in his ears, sayin' _lalalala _as loud as he can. "

When was Leo supposed to be coming back anyway?

"When is Leonardo due back?" she asked, mirroring my thoughts.

"Splinter said the training period was a year. It's only been five months." My voice betrayed me. I sounded nothin' less than despairing. Her fingertips glanced my shoulder then, hesitating briefly before settling down.

"Well. You haven't killed each other yet." It was a stab at dry humour. Four brothers were always on the verge of killing each other. But lately it had felt more savage between Don and I. He just didn't seem to _get it_. Not any of it.

"I just never knew how much of a jerk Don could be," I muttered but left it at that. She'd heard it all before. Technically, Don was leader while Leo was gone. Technically. It didn't make him one. It didn't mean he'd earned it.

I didn't like arguin' with him. But I wasn't just going to _give in_.

She didn't say anything, but her hand slipped up around the back of my neck. I tensed, all thoughts of Don sitting smug in his alcove gone. Her hand cupped against my neck and pulled, urging my head downwards and I went, rigid and uneasy, until the side of my face made contact with her bony shoulder. It was strange, this contact. Stranger even than the time she'd kissed me, months ago. The pressure of her cold hand is soft and the flesh of my neck is tender. Her shoulder is hard and uncomfortable, the bone digging into me. The whole damn position is awkward, in fact and feels unnatural.

I sit abruptly back up. The motion throws her arm back and she lets a sharp hiss out through her teeth. I glance at her sharply but she's recovered already, sucking back hard on another cigarette.

"What's wrong?"

She half-laughs, shakes her head. "It's been a big week."

It sounds like a lie, the way she says it so calmly. I lean in, closer to her for the first proper look I've fixed on her all night, realising that the shadow dappling one side of her face is not a shadow at all.

I feel very, very still.

"What happened?"

She shakes her head again, turns away from me. "Don't start freakin' out on me." Even as she speaks I start forward, knees skidding the grass, grasping her by one wrist, forcing her to turn back. "Chrissakes."

"Who did this?" I can feel it, the pressure in my chest, behind my eyes. The shyness is gone as I take her jaw in my hand, tilt her head towards me, examining the bruise that discolours one cheekbone. My eyes have grown accustomed to the dark. Her left eye is puffy and swollen, I can imagine the watery redness of it if there were light to see by.

"Who did this?" My voice is a whisper, hoarse and rough, and she flinches from it as though it scratches. I have to whisper. If I don't, I'll lose control.

She bats my hand away, sneers. Always her last recourse, the sneer.

"Tell me." I grab her by both arms and she whimpers, cuts it off abruptly.

"I knew you'd freak. It's not a big deal – " she begins but I cut her off.

"Not a big deal? Are you – what – how can you say that?"

"It's not what you think. Get a grip."

I seethe, helpless to the gnawing, slathering fury that demands I seek justice, seek it _now_. To get up, leave her, and track down the creep who's hurt her, hurt _him_. But I can't. I don't know enough. She isn't telling me. And I'm helpless here, chained down by this need for information, the urge to shake it out of her and the all-reaching desire to lay hands on the bastard who touched her, who _dared – _

"Don't let him get away with it!" I'm imploring her but it doesn't sound like it. "Let me take him down."

"Forget it. I don't know where he is. He's one face out of a million. Just forget it. You'll never find him." Her expression is intractable calm, a stillness composing her features carefully even in the face of my teeth-bared rage. She's gone limp in my grip, her thin arms soft, acquiescing to me. She stares me straight in the eye, fearless and mild. It's disarming. Slowly the spots dancing in front of my eyes fade. Slowly my pulse stops raging. Slowly, my jaw loosens again, my muscles unclench and only when I release her do I realise just how hard I was gripping her, see the shadows my hands have made to her arms in the dim warm night.

There's silence for a moment. Then I hear my voice, breaking the quiet.

"I could – there's a way, surely – "

She's shaking her head, rapidly, reaching again for her bottle. "It happens, forget it."

But I can't. My fists clench and unclench, a flurry of thoughts tumble through my mind, a looping argument _get her to tell, there's a million guys in this city, he'll have a characteristic, it might've been a one off, he might make a habit of it, you can find him, you can, you must…_

I've lost count of the number of working girls I've helped out of a jam the last two and a half years. What does it mean if I can't help her?

Besides me she sighs and moves closer. I'm staring off into the long shaded jumble of the park, suddenly realising how easy it would be to get up, leave, melt into the darkness, find some other lowlife to crush when her hand is on mine, jerking me from those thoughts even as it gives me more reason to run.

"It's over." She tells me. "It's happened. No, it's not right. But it's done. If you really wanna do something for me, just be with me."

"It's not enough," I growl and she squeezes my hand as hard as she can. Which isn't much.

"It is."

"How bad is it?" Did I want to know?

She turns her head away, eyebrows knitting together, like she wants to squirm away from the question. "Don't ask me that. It won't change anything."

It won't. But I could. Couldn't I? If I could get my hands on him…

"What about your job?" I hear myself saying and she frowns, purses her lips a little, lifts my hand up and strokes my skin. It's a sweet, soft, tickling feeling and somehow I calm a little more.

"What about it?" she responds.

"Will that change anything? Thistleways gig I mean."

She sticks her lip out a little more, draws her brows closer together, her gaze fixed on my hand, turning it over and over in hers, stroking it.

"Street walking is my job, Raphael." She twines her fingers in mine, her long, slim hand and I skip a breath thinking how easy it would be to crush her hand within mine.

"But…" I'm torn between the anger that's still pulsing hot and hard and the strange sweetness of her touch, of wanting to pull away and stay right there, even to touch her back. It's confusing, and I don't cope with confusion. "You don't have to work as much now."

Her eyes dart up from my hand to meet mine, glittering dully with surprise. "Buy why wouldn't I? If I can? There's money to be made."

I'm confused, I'm angry and I don't know how to say what I'm thinking. That every time I watch her shoot up I want to break the needle. That she'd be safer off the streets. That I'd like her to be safer. That I can't always be there. That I _wasn't_ there and it's making me feel crazy.

Then, as suddenly as a gunshot, she drops her face to my hand and kisses the palm of it. It sends a red-hot jolt through me so fierce I jump a little. When she lifts her head again the spot remains warm.

I know what's coming. What's about to happen. Her face draws closer, her lids half-lowered.

"I took one of them to Project Dignity." My voice was quiet in the still night but she heard me. Her expression snapped open, confusion creasing her features. "One of – what?" She only sounds puzzled but as she stares at me I see the change, like something switching behind her eyes.

"_What?_" Her voice was steel.

My fists clenched and I fought with myself, getting agitatedly to my feet. "Earlier tonight. I saw one on a street corner and recognised her. So I picked her up and dropped her off."

Behind me she was getting to her feet, struggling to rise quickly. "You did what?"

I whirled around to her face her, glaring. She stared back at me, sheer aghast disbelief contorting her features.

"What if I were right?" I demanded of her, throwing my arms up in the air. "Would you have me ignore her instead? What if she were fucked? I thought she needed my help. I'm still not convinced she didn't. "

"What, you get to decide if she's a victim or not? When did that become up to you?" Her voice rose, echoing in the empty park and I responded to it, shouting back:

"Hey, I make a decision that needs to be made. If she's happy, they'll let her go."

She made a noise of frustration, stomping her boot into the grass, then advanced on me. "They're _brainwashers_, they put you in a room and tell you you're fucked up until you have no choice but to believe it, goddamn it!"

"Maybe they _are_ fucked up," I could feel it rising in me, that I was powerless to stop it all erupting. "Who are you to say? After all that – that – work – seeing what, they said, somethin' disgusting – fifteen men a night!"

"Newsflash, Raphael!" her voice as sneering as I'd ever heard it, her face an ugly mask of fury and hate. "They're _hookers_! Lots of clients equals lots of cash! If I had fifteen clients every goddamned night I'd be over the fucking moon. Hell, we fucking _pray_ for fifteen clients every night."

"Do you pray to get the shit kicked out of you as well?" I snapped back at her and she made a sarcastic sound, almost like a laugh.

"Oh I knew you'd wanna rub that in – "

"You expect me to think it's a _good_ thing some thug did that – "

"Who said anything about it being good, it just happened, that's all and I said – "

"It wouldn't happen if you weren't – "

"That's not good enough! That's not an excuse! It shouldn't happen at all!"

"But it did! And it did because you're a hooker! You don't think that's fucked up?"

"Give me a break!" she's spitting with disgust and we're facing off in the park, rending the night with our words. "I made a choice to be out here!"

"Yeah, some choice, when it's motivated by a freakin' needle!"

She's momentarily stunned into silence, eyes round as saucers, even the black one straining against the swell. "Oh, we're going there now? You're gonna make a judgement call on that too?" She's breathless with indignation. "How about if I tell you one of my busiest nights I had twenty-two guys? You gonna find that disgusting as well?"

I wasn't going to back off from this. "I'm not sayin' it's wrong, what you do. I'm sayin' it's the wrong world to do it in. I'm sayin' it'd be better if you did it not to pay for smack. Off the streets."

She doesn't seem to know what to say, fists flailing at the air by her sides in frustration, slamming her heel into the grass. There's a crack in her voice when she speaks. "Don't – don't make this about me! This isn't about me. This is about that girl and what you did – you had no right! You don't get to make that choice for her!"

"They did!"

"No they didn't! That's what I - it's like with – with this – " she gestured to her bruised face, flinging her hand upwards. I think she might be crying. "You don't know - you – you – _fuck you_, you know." She's rageful again. "I don't need your fucking help, you think you need to rescue me? I don't need you to do shit for me. Neither do they. "

"Who's going to help them then?" My temper's rising higher and faster, accelerated by her words, by the reluctant hurt they wring out of me.

"They don't need help!" she shrieked. "If I wanna fuck men to buy smack, that's my choice! They wanna come here and work and fuck fifteen men a night, that's their choice! Got it?"

She stormed forward jabbed at me then, poking me hard in my upper left plastron and my vision clouded, smoky and red. We stood toe to toe, almost on eye level and she was thrusting her body forward, trying to drive me back. I didn't like it.

I stepped forward.

"That doesn't make it _right_." I said savagely. "It doesn't make it a good thing to do. And I'd rather make the fuckin' mistake then let it go and risk the alternative. "I was forcing her backwards, drawing myself up so that the two or three inches I had over her were as towering as I could make them. She stumbled away, but kept her eyes fixed and furious on me, her teeth bared. "I don't have to like it. And I _won't_ let you ride your goddamn high horse all over me on this. " I'd backed her up against the trunk of a tree, the shadows locking us in. "It's _not_ a normal life. It's not a _desirable_ life. It's fuckin' disgusting." And before I was even aware of doing it I'd drawn back my fist and slammed it hard into the trunk of the tree, beside her head, a few strands of her hair pinned beneath it. She jerked back, breathed in sharply, then levelled her head.

"You wanna hit me, Raphael?" Her voice was dangerously cool in the dark, nothing but the faint shine of her eyes clearly visible. "Get it out of your system then, baby, if it'll make you feel better." She knew she couldn't do a thing about it, the edges of her voice dripping with mockery.

I lurch forward, driving my fist harder into the trunk, the tension hurtling down my arm hot and painful. I'm inches from her face and her breathing is short, the sharp smell of nicotine in my nostrils. That she thinks I would, that I _could_, that I could be like the creep who's banged her up. There's nothing I can force this shattering anger onto. Nothing.

Then I step back, unclenching my fist and feeling the muscles loosen reluctantly

She stays frozen for a moment, pressed up against the tree. Then her shoulders sag and her face falls. She stares at me, no longer rageful or spitting or hysterical. Just terribly, horribly sad.

When she walks away, I don't try and stop her.


	4. Chapter 4

**CHAPTER FOUR:**

**X**

There were no tears to shed.

Work was busy, the warm weather bringing the punters out in droves. She was picking guys up on her way back to her spot, not even having to wait.

She'd dosed up heavier than usual in the early morning, unconscious for most of the day, fading in and out of sleep the rest, not having time when she did wake to even read for awhile.

She was vaguely aware of a hollowness, a gnawing emptiness that made the world seem unreal and distant, like it was a fiction she was observing. Gin did little to fill it, but a few lines of cocaine with a client helped. The cocktail of uppers and downers had her stumbling through the night, each foot feeling like it stepped into a cushion of marshmallow, her head languidly bobbing up and down like a balloon. She felt mean.

"_If you come looking, I'll stop hiding, if we're not talking then at least we're not fighting. I'd go to pieces… if I were together at all…"_ It was a little known song, a song so obscure it had only been recorded once as far as she knew, by an obscure Australian artist. She'd fetched the CD from her downtown locker earlier than evening and had Lenny play it for her, once every time she was on the stoop long enough to hear it. "_Everyone's talking, and nobody's listening, everyone's busy but nobody's thinking… and I've got some ideas, but I can't stop drinking… and nobody's listening to me, nobody's listening to me."_

Her voice swelled on the final lines, rising above the tide of traffic and people colouring the streets that night. A couple of passers-by applauded her lightly and she flicked cigarette ash at them.

"Go fuck yourselves." She muttered.

She leaned up against the 7-11, ignoring the tapping from the window within as the clerk tried to get her to move. Let him come out and tell her. She'd give him a piece of her mind and not skimp on the serving. A car honked from the street and she glanced up to see if it was for her, and saw a small Asian woman rushing across the road toward her, face contorted in distress and heedless of the traffic.

"Amber! Amber!" the woman shrieked, hurtling over the pavement and throwing herself on Amber before she had time to fully realise what was going on. The woman was in hysterics, cheeks tear-stained and red, shrieking in Thai as she shook Amber urgently.

Amber struggled through her foggy head to focus, her first urge to throw a roundhouse at the woman's face then realising something about her was familiar, that she'd met her before –

"Whoah, whoah, settle, settle petal!" She cried, gripping the woman by the shoulders and forcing her to be still. "What is it, what's the matter?" She stared into the woman's face, recognition dawning on her as the features became clear beneath the snot and tears. "You came into Thistleways didn't you?"

The woman fumbled with something in her pocket, withdrawing a crumpled piece of paper. Amber recognised her own writing on it – her name, the street address of her beat. She nodded to show the woman she remembered.

The woman began speaking in Thai again, hysteria swift rising in her voice and Amber's head started pounding.

"I don't understand!" she snapped. "Just – just calm down. For a minute. Shhhh." She put a finger to her lips and repeated it. "Shhhhhh."

The woman stopped speaking abruptly and stared at Amber with a stricken look, her breath coming in hiccoughs.

"Now, what's your name?" Amber said. She pointed to herself. "Amber. Now you?" She pointed to the woman's chest.

"Tran," the woman indicated to herself, sniffling, her eyes wet and hopeful on Amber's face and Amber sighed. Maybe Jun was at home.

**XI**

I wasn't the type to cut lowlifes any slack, but even I knew I was taking it a bit far.

They were car thieves – small fry – kids, really. Maybe younger even than me.

But right then, it didn't matter.

I laid into them with everything I had. As my foot connected with the gut of the smaller one, there was a flash behind my eyes, a whisper that this was dirty, low-down. It was muffled by the bigger guy's scream as he went down.

It was just me then, my breath loud and hard in my ears, my knuckles tingling, my whole body hunched over and quivering with the adrenalin racketing through me.

The kids were silent, crumpled on the ground, motionless. Slowly, my rage subsided and I became aware the knuckles on my left hand were split, leaking blood down to the wrist. As my temper cooled, my fist began to throb but I ignored it, turning instead back to the shadows of the narrow streets that snaked in every direction, disappearing into them.

The memory of Amber's bruised face kept flashing into my mind, interspersed with the words she'd shouted at me. I used to fight with Leo all the time, and brawls with Don were becoming a regular occurrence. But my relationship with Amber seemed a more fragile thing, not strengthened by blood ties or shared history, not bound by familial love.

In fact, some niggling little voice was telling me it was over.

To be honest, I wasn't sure whether I should be broken or relieved. I mean, it would take care of all those uncomfortable sensations I'd been getting around her lately. Eliminate the inconvenience of this strange and unsatisfying bond, the sheer and savage impossibility of it.

But fuck it all, it was inconvenient and impossible, but I wanted it. Anyway.

I remembered another time, just a few months before, when she'd sworn and spat at me, said vicious and unforgiving words because she was coming off smack and desperate for a fix. I'd put her in that position then. But things had worked out okay.

Kinda like how Leo and I would savage each other, say whatever it took to drive the points sharp and home, and a few hours later act as though nothing had happened, team up in commandeering the game consoles before Mikey could. This could be like that. Maybe it just took a few days. A couple had already passed since she'd left me standing alone in the park. Maybe it was enough.

But Leo and I had brotherhood on our side. Trust and loyalty, despite all the bickering.

Amber and me got no ties like that.

I was up on our roof, the one with the smelly, ratty old couch, overlooking the dark, glittering expanse of the river, nursing my sore knuckles, helmet by my feet. I wasn't even sure how I'd gotten there, or how long I'd been sitting. Except that in this silence, this stillness, the memory of our fight was able to play, uninterrupted, through my head like a bad movie.

Just thinking of her all beat up like that made me feel crazy again. And I remembered the girl I'd picked up – no, the woman. Older than me. How she'd been rousing on me on the street. Demanding more money when she thought the matron at Project Dignity was part of… whatever is what she thought I wanted.

I stood up and replaced the helmet. I knew what I had to do.

Twenty minutes later I pulled up in front of Project Dignity's head offices. Ascending the stairs again I hesitated before ringing the bell, following it quickly with a heavy rap or two on the door. As I waited my nerves grew more taut, my muscles tensing, fingers beating out an agitated rhythm on the doorframe. Leo would – no, wait, _Don_ would have my skin if he knew about this. But c'mon. It's not like it was the first time I'd broken the rules this far.

When the same lady from the other night opened the door, she was kind enough to pause instead of immediately slamming the door in my face, though the expression on her careworn face was suspicious and demanding.

"Er… hi…" I began awkwardly, my voice sounding muffled and quiet to my ears, confined as it was within the helmet. I wonder what it sounded like to her. "You remember me… from the other night?"

She was unwilling to give an inch, I could see, just glared at me and jutted her chin out in the slightest of nods.

"Yes. You dropped Tran by. It was good of you." Her tone was grudging. Sheesh, lady, you're welcome.

"Yeah, well, the thing is – " I paused again, reaching up to scratch at the back of my head as I always did when feeling awkward, except that my head was behind three inches of metal. "The thing is, I need to talk to Tan."

"Tran." She corrected me shortly and I shrugged. Damn.

"Yeah, uh, Tran, that's right."

"I'm sorry, we don't permit visitors." Brittle cold she was, and began shutting the door in my face again. And again, I had to slam an arm into it to push it back.

"Hey now, look here, I'm a pal of hers. And it's important!"

A flicker of fear had contorted the woman's hard, lined features but she pushed it back quickly and when she spoke to me her voice was low so as to keep it even.

"You are not permitted to come here and try and bully or domineer me into allowing you access. By attempting to impose your physical self into this haven you are creating an unsafe space and a hostile environment, which is intolerable. Kindly back up immediately."

Wha - ? In my confusion I stepped back and then I saw it. Behind her, at the end of the narrow hallway, a flash of orange hair and a bruised face. So quick I almost thought it was an illusion of the grime layered over the visor of my helmet. Baffled I pushed forward, barrelling past the woman before I'd even realised I'd done it.

"Hey! Hey, hang on there, is that – " I thundered down the hallway, ignoring the doors that lined either side, reaching the end where it opened up into a communal living space, littered with sofas and a old wide screen TV. And there, curling herself up into one corner of a battered old couch, was Amber, scowling at me and lighting a cigarette. "Wha – what are _you_ doing here?"

"I could ask you the same question." She snapped in return and then the woman rejoined us, raising her voice in fearful alarm.

"Stop right there!" One hand was outstretched in protestation and I turned to look at her, even as she faltered, speaking up loudly over the waver in her voice. "I have to ask you to leave, immediately. It is disrespectful for you to be – "

"Take it easy, Megan, he's with me." Amber interjected casually, her lean legs crossed over each other on the cushions and Megan turned to look at her, growing more flustered, pushing her long grey hair back over her ear.

"Amber, the women at this facility don't need to be subjected to this sort of thing. It's not – "

"You're right." Amber stood up abruptly and reached for her knapsack where it lay on the carpet. "It isn't fair. Come on, ya big lummox." She didn't look at me and though I think she was trying to be humorous, it fell flat. I could feel my fists tightening. Near the doorway, Megan flailed some more as Amber moved towards it.

"Amber, I didn't mean that you should go!"

Amber paused and looked at her, a mild sort of surprise in her eyes. "I know. But I can already tell ya, this guy ain't gonna leave without me."

Megan wrung her hands, shot me a glance full of poison and apprehension. "If you feel you're in danger from him – "

"I'm not." Amber's voice was short and precluded any argument. "But I wanna go anyway." I was set apart from this discussion, it taking place on some level I wasn't privy to. I could feel it in the words they weren't saying. Just what the hell was Amber doing _here_, of all places anyway? With a final glance at Megan who gazed after us in distress, I followed Amber back down the dark corridor to the street beyond, the leather of my suit creaking a little in the quiet.

Out on the street I followed Amber down about half a block before she whirled on me and demanded: "What the fuck do you think you were doing?"

And all the nervous trepidation I'd felt upon seeing her again, the shallow hope, flew into rage.

"Me? What about you? After all your talk, huh, you're getting all chummy with them!"

She spat on the ground, flung her cigarette at the pavement and shook her head. "Yet another example of you not knowing the whole damn story. I was doing recon, okay?"

That drew me up short. "The fuck? Recon?" she nodded once, a jerk, and I spread out my hands. "Why?"

She scowled again, the bruise on her face now a sickly puke-yellow, and crossed her arms over her chest. "What do you care?"

"Yeah, you're right." The bitterness in my gut was spewing out of my mouth. "I don't care. I couldn't care less. How'd you guess?"

She rolled her eyes. "Don't get stroppy. I would've thought you'd be jumpin' for joy, seein' me in there. Being 'saved'."

The hell with this. I didn't need it. Didn't need her to see how every word she threw at me sent me staggering backwards. I turned on my heel and strode away from her, heading back towards the bike. Behind me she shrieked and I heard her footsteps pound over the pavement before she hit me with everything she had.

"Damnit! That's it? You're just going to walk away from me? You fuck!"

I rounded on her as she continued to fly at me with her thin fists, their impact further dulled by the thick leather and metal they struck, hair flying in her face, contorted and bright. I caught up her wrists, held her at arm's length as she struggled, writhed in my grip.

"Whaddya mean?" I shouted back, exasperated, furious. "Isn't that what you want me to do?"

She stopped fighting and I could see her gulp, choke back the tears, letting her head drop downwards to hide it. We stood there on the street in a pool of lamplight, me in my heavy metal suit and she in her Mickey Mouse dress, a turtle and a hooker in an uneasy face off. I let her go and her arms fell to dangle limply at her sides. In this light I could see the fading bruises on her neck, that they extended below the neckline of her dress, patterned one arm. Her eye was less swollen, and her face was tired and anxious looking. She looked small and frail beneath the neon light.

I was almost overwhelmed by the sudden and very horrible desire to put my arms around her.

When I spoke my voice was soft. "Do you – need my help?"

With a barely stifled sob she threw herself onto me again, only this time to wrap her arms around my neck, burying her face against the unyielding leather while I stood there, more bewildered than ever, before placing a tentative hand on her back.

**XII**

Amber directed Raphael to a beautifully restored building on 39th and 1st. He parked the bike and she led him up the steps to the buzzers, hitting the button for number three. After a moment there was a click and she spoke softly into the mouthpiece: "It's Amber." And the glass security doors buzzed to admit them entrance.

They stood in silence in the tiny elevator, both of them looking concertedly away from each other, its closeness stifling as Amber rubbed at her red eyes and Raphael's heavy suit brushed the mirrored walls. She hugged her arms close around her chest and he clenched his fists by his side. When the lift stopped on the third floor, he let her out first and followed, then grabbed hold of her arm before she could rap the door of the apartment that took up one entire floor of the building.

"Listen – uh – the reason I was there tonight was to talk to that girl. To square it with her I did the right thing. That's all. I swear."

Her blue eyes were watery as she shot him an indecipherable look over her shoulder. "You still can." And knocked on the white wooden door with its elegant gold trim.

The woman who let them in made no sound at sight of The Nightwatcher standing there on her plush welcome mat, but simply widened her eyes in restrained alarm. Amber hastened to explain.

"He's on our side. Well. He wants to help, anyway. I've known him over a year now. It's cool, Mae."

But he waited until the woman gave him a hesitant nod, after giving him a thorough appraisal, before entering.

She was a beautiful Thai woman, perhaps in her forties but it was difficult to tell with the gleaming softness of her skin and the elegant and understated way her face was made up. Her long and modest, though obviously expensive, dress draped attractively off her slim frame and her gleaming black hair was wrapped into a flattering chignon. She led them quietly down a hallway lined in soft white pile carpeting into a spacious lounge room, furnished in white leather sofas with a magnificent glass coffee table in the center, upon a white marble stand. Curled up on the sofas were two other Thai women, clutching large crystal glasses filled with red wine, both looking anxious and stressed. One was a young girl in jeans and a sloppy t-shirt, hair cropped close around her head and glasses perched on her nose. The other was splashier, in a purple mini-dress, her heavily hair-sprayed curled hair steadily unravelling into a terrific bird's nest with the way she kept pulling at it. Both women looked up as they entered and the splashy one made a horrified squeaking noise in her throat as he clunked awkwardly into the stylish and feminine haven.

It was _her_. The girl he'd picked up.

She began to make a high-pitched shrieking in the back of her throat, squirming up against the back of the cushions as the other girl gave Amber a bewildered and inquiring glance, Amber hastening forward, looking rough and grungy in the refined setting, speaking soothingly to the girl.

"It's okay, Tran, he's not going to take you anywhere! He's here to help! I promise he won't take you back to them. That's not what he's here to do!"

The girl with glasses was translating rapidly in Thai to Tran, both of them coming over to her to grab her hands and calm her down. She asked a few frantic question in Thai to which a soothing response was given but kept darting him terrified looks and protesting frantically in her language so that it twisted him up inside. Her feet drawn up in front of her, he saw they were bare and scratched, which further threw him. He didn't know what to do but it was becoming clearer that she wouldn't calm down unless he _did_ do something.

Finally, he knelt down on the carpet before them, his leather-clad legs sinking into the lush pile, holding his hands out palm up in a supplicatory fashion, speaking as soothingly and softly as he could.

"Take it easy, sweetheart. I'm real sorry about what happened. But you can count on me, I ain't gonna take you anywhere from now on without your say so first, you got it? I promise."

It took a couple of minutes to translate his vernacular, but eventually the message was communicated and Tran sat back for a few minutes, panting and upset, but calmed. She took a deep draught of her wine and then sat forward in her seat, jabbed a finger towards him where he knelt still and began haranguing him in harsh Thai, finishing up with a few more of the 'Scht! Scht!" noises.

The elegant woman, who'd observed the whole scene leaning up against the set of multi-sized white cabinets along one wall could not suppress a smile.

"She wants to know why Uncle did not want her to work. She is asking you if you plan on paying her contract off for her since you were so insistent she not be permitted to make money. She asks if you took her there so that your girlfriend – " and here she jerked her head in Amber's direction. " – could have more clients? She says there's plenty to go around and that a proper Uncle should not play favourites."

Three sets of amused eyes were on him then, two dark and one fair blue – although there was almost certainly a blush on Amber's face as well. He sat back on his haunches and threw his hands up.

"Whoah – whoah – okay, just back up. First of all, what is with all this 'Uncle' business, huh?"

They exchanged looks, deciding silently who would tell him. Then Amber spoke.

"Due to something getting a little lost in translation, Tran was under the impression you take care of the girls in a certain neighbourhood – not quite a pimp, not quite a client, a sort of protector and beneficient watcher."

Raphael was immensely glad of the helmet then, because beneath that many amused female gazes he was certain the rush of blood he felt would be entirely visible upon his cheeks.

"Uh… right." He hemmed awkwardly and moved quickly on. "Secondly – what the hell is going on here exactly? Who are you people?"

The elegant woman sunk down into an armchair, folding her legs over and arranging her hands composedly on her lap. "Perhaps you should remove your helmet first, then we can all speak face to face." Her English was only slightly accented, clipped and perfect. Amber rushed to speak.

"He can't. If anyone ever knew his identity, he'd be at risk. A lot of gangs in this city would love to get their hands on him."

She nodded once to show she understood then turned back to Raphael, gesturing to her bosom with one manicured hand. "My name is Mae Prem. I have met the other lady over here through Amber but her name is Jun and I understand that she works as the Multicultural Project Officer at Thistleways," Jun nodded to indicate this was accurate and Mae continued. "Tran I believe you have already met."

Tran glanced over at the sound of her name, but otherwise she looked confused, a furrow of concentration on her brow as she struggled to keep up with the rapid English conversation.

"Now, introductions over," this woman was in her element, calmly directing the action, all eyes in the room fixed on her in the dim-light softness of their pure white surroundings, so authoritative he didn't notice she had neglected to explain exactly what it was _she_ did. "Perhaps you would care to explain why you took it upon yourself to remove Tran against her will from her working conditions?"

Such was the authority and regency of the woman that he felt almost abashed, uncertain of himself before remembering what it was that had so outraged him, the news report with all those crying, frightened women, their faces at the docks, in the brothel, Amber's bruises…

"Some creep in this city has been importing women illegally into the country to work the sex trade. From what I understand, it's against their will too – he's turnin' them into – s-slaves," he stumbled over the word 'sex', the image it conjured too grotesque a one to swallow.

Mae smiled secretively, her rose-coloured lips curving up the perfect slope of her cheek. "Is that what you understand?"

She was so quietly imperious it roused his temper and he sat up straight. "Yeah. That's right. And I'm not one to sit back and let that kinda crap happen to innocent people. Not in _my_ city. It seems I made a mistake but I thought Tran was one of those girls. I was doin' the right thing, as I saw it."

"The path to hell…" Amber muttered beneath her breath and he shot a glance at her but she was staring down at the carpet, sitting upon it as he was, one hand wrapped around a knee.

Mae cocked her head to one side and regarded him thoughtfully. When she spoke, he was surprised. "I do apologise, I have been very rude. Amidst all the drama I neglected to offer you a drink. Would you care for one?"

He would. He would very much. He was melting inside the suit. But how was he supposed to drink it through the helmet? So instead he waved a hand in dismissive thanks. "Nah, I'm fine, thanks."

She rose and fetched a bottle of wine from a table under the window and coming back to the group filled Amber a glass then topped up Jun and Tran's. Placing it upon a white coaster on the coffee table, she eased back into her chair, the leather creaking softly beneath her slight weight.

"So, your opinion is that this person transporting these women into this country is a fiend and a criminal?"

Unconsciously, his fists tightened. "That's about the gist of it, yeah."

"And you plan to take him down?"

"When I track him down. Yeah."

With a little smile curving her lips, she turned to Amber who was watching the action intently, chewing on one long strand of hair. "Should I be concerned?"

Amber's eyes darted across to him, then back to her. "No."

Puzzled, he shifted, frowned inside the helmet. "What?"

Recrossing her legs, Mae smoothed back a nonexistent stray hair and sighed. "Well, Nightwatcher, your hunt is over. I am the fiend you seek."

For a long, muffled moment, it didn't sink in. He sat, still and silent on the carpet, a hulking warrior in a china room and watched her words rotate in front of his visor. "What?" He repeated, and she chuckled, a melodic little sound.

"The one you have been pursuing – the one bringing poor Thai women into the country to work in the sex trade – that is me."


	5. Chapter 5

**CHAPTER FIVE**

**XIII**

The silence in the air was heavy as a smell.

I kept on staring at the woman. She gazed steadily back at me, expressionless. I could feel Amber's eyes on me, the other women staring.

"What?" I asked again, dumbly.

Mae tittered again, a sound like a tinkling bell.

"You Americans." She said with a sort of affectionate disdain. "You think all we Asian women are weak little flowers, our petals trampled by the weight of the world. That you need to rescue us. " She smiled at me, her mouth widening to reveal set of brilliant white teeth. "Are you familiar with the concept of Imperialism?" She didn't wait for me to answer, just continued. "We are very tough but we know how to play soft. We know how to flatter or how to be cowed just as we know how to be ferocious and how to fight. You think the person who has been bringing the women into this country is a monster, a heartless villain exploiting poor, ignorant and defenceless women. What would you say then to learn that I was once one of them, a prostitute in the bars of Bangkok who came to America on a contract?" She paused, letting me absorb that information for a long moment before then leaning forward in her chair, fixing her gaze intently on the visor of the helmet, somehow finding my eyes through its mirrored surface. "What do you see when you look at me, vigilante? A whore? A woman? An Asian? An illegal immigrant? Maybe you see me as all of these, as indeed I am, but I hope at the least you see a human being, which I also am. "

I could say nothing, not anymore, do nothing but kneel there in silence on her rich shag pile carpet and listen to her smooth, calm voice.

"It only took me three months to pay off a $30,000 contract. I worked seven days a week, fifteen hour or sometimes eighteen hour days. I saw many clients and did many extra services to pay that off, but that was my choice. I could've taken six months, I could've taken a year. Or more. But I, like many of the women here on similar contracts, wanted to pay it off as quickly as I could so that I might begin to make my own money. Then I could relax. And when I had paid my contract off and I began to enjoy the lifestyle and the money of this country I began to think. And I reasoned – well, why should I not also assist my countrywomen to come here, if that is what they want? And now, " she made an elegant little gesture to the room. "Here I am."

Everyone was still, each of them looking at me and waiting for my response, even Tran who couldn't have understood much of what Mae had said. All except Mae, who took a sip from her glass, and stared contemplatively out across the room to the double glass doors leading onto her balcony over the city.

My head was racing so hard and hot with so many thoughts I could barely keep track of them. I struggled to hold on, to follow them all through but one by one I lost my grip and they ran over each other, getting tangled impossibly together so that a throbbing began behind my eyes.

"But – ya make a profit offa them. It ain't charity!"

She glanced back at me, dark eyes twinkling. "Of course. I am a business-woman after all. But I deeply resent the suggestion I bring them here against their will or under false pretences. "

"Those women," I said then, insistent. "Those women at the docks – at the brothel. They were scared, they were cryin'. They didn't wanna be there."

"Did you ever think," it was Amber, strand of hair twirling round one finger, eyes staring into the glass table-top, "they might've been scared of _you_?"

I didn't answer her, but I didn't have to. My silence was enough.

Tran turned to Jun and they began a hurried, whispered conversation in Thai. I pushed myself to my feet and began pacing, unable to help noticing the grimy tracks my boots were making to the pure white of the carpeting. Mae politely did not notice.

"Are you – ya can't actually be sayin' – it never happens?"

Mae sighed and let her head fall back against the chair. "No, it most certainly does happen, most unfortunately. It's just that it is not anywhere on the scale that some claim."

Jun spoke up, prompted by Tran who was tugging on her arm and whispering fiercely. "Tran wishes to say that if the police ever found her in one of these brothels that she would lie and say she was forced into it and trapped there. That way she has more chance of claiming refugee status, rather than being deported."

"A lot of them do that," Amber piped up again contemplatively, leaning back on her hands and stretching long, skinny legs out in front of her. Behind the mask I blinked at a large discoloured bruise peeking beneath the hem of her skirt. "it's partly where the misperception comes from. They just do what they gotta do. Same way if it's been quiet I go to the doctor and say I wanna go clean, get a methadone prescription. Sell the 'done, go and buy smack. " She didn't look me in the eye as she said it, just tapped the scuffed toes of her boots together.

Tran stood up, pointed a finger at me and in a voice just a little gentler than her previous scolding, made an enquiry of me.

Jun looked from her to me, shrugged. "Tran asks what you would choose: making five cents an hour weaving baskets or two hundred dollars a day entertaining white tourists in a bar?"

"And that's in Thailand. You already know the kinda money I make a night, baby" Amber was lighting up a cigarette, inhaling deeply. "Can you blame them for coming here when they hear about it?"

I stopped, in front of the wall of white cabinets, my palms up and against it, supporting my weight as I wrestled still with the tangled knot of thoughts worming its way through my brain. It didn't all add up. It still didn't seem right to me – holding people to a contract like that, that they couldn't make money doing something else, that they had to lie or be deported. But I could feel the eyes of these four women boring into the back of me, steady and calm and I knew there was no arguing with them. Whether I liked it or not, they were telling me this was their game.

Sighing heavily I turned back to them, shoulders slumping and holding out a hand, palm up.

"So whaddya need me for?"

Mae drained her glass and held out her hand to Amber who passed over her cigarette. After a deep draw, Mae held the smoke in her lungs a long moment then exhaled in a whoosh through her nose.

"Because, unfortunately, it _does_ happen. And it would seem that Project Dignity are involved."

**XIV**

The house sat, silent and still, in the middle of the street. A few of the shuttered windows were rimmed in gold, indicating there were lights on within, that there were people inside working away as the day turned slowly to evening, people upstairs in the overnight rooms, watching television or sleeping, chatting amongst each other.

Amber stood in front of the building, looking up at it quietly, arms hugged around herself. A breeze blew her long, straight hair into her face and she shook her head vigorously, irritated. Tran had refused to come. Amber couldn't blame her, but it was going to make things more difficult. She knew that Raphael had gone around the back of the building, dropped into the small square yard they had, was clambering up to the top floors. As agreed.

Sighing, she ignored the dull ache in her head, the increasing tremor of her hands as need began slowly to edge its way into her consciousness, and ascended the steps of the Project Dignity house, rapping on the door sharply.

After a few moments, Megan answered it and stood back in surprise as Amber pushed past her, muttering a short greeting.

"Amber? What is it?"

She ignored her, strode down the hall to the back living quarters, through them to the door that led to the staircase. It was locked. Megan followed after her, sounding frustrated.

"Amber, you can't treat this place like a revolving door. If you really want us to help you, you need to make a real commitment here."

Amber whirled on her. "I need to speak to Sheila."

Megan was taken aback. "What – but why?"

"Confidential." Amber was terse. "Let me up Megan."

Megan folded her arms over her shelf-like bosom, long grey hair framing a stern face. "Sheila's working. This is outside her consultation hours."

Amber felt the urge to turn around and start kicking the door. But then Megan would doubtless call the police and the whole reason they'd agreed Raphael was not to come in with her was to avoid that very thing. The effort of restraining the emotion caused tears to prick her eyes and she abruptly changed tack, letting herself crumple in front of Megan.

"Please," she whimpered, tears falling freely. "Sheila's the only one who can understand. Please Megan, please."

Megan softened, the lines in her face no longer so deep, and relented, coming over to unlock the door even as Amber could feel she retained a smidgen of doubt. Megan was misguided, but she wasn't a bad person – nonetheless, Amber felt no guilt as she once again pushed past the older woman and jogged up the stairs, tears instantly drying.

She entered the office at the back of the house without knocking, so that the woman seated at the small, cluttered desk whirled to her feet in alarm, then narrowed her eyes at Amber.

"You. They told me you came in yesterday. What are you up to?"

"Shut up, Sheila, we need to talk."

Sheila was about to retort when the window overlooking the back yard was suddenly jammed up. It had been open a couple of inches to let in the summer breeze, which made it easier for the person now letting themselves into the room, a stocky, brute figure completely covered in a silver leather suit, a helmet obscuring his features. Sheila gasped, outraged and backed up against the wall as the Nightwatcher – Raphael – strode into the centre of the room. He paused upon sight of the angry woman and cocked his head to one side.

"What?" Amber queried him, and he lifted his hands in confusion.

"You're the - the woman who was on the television the other day." The bewilderment in his voice gave way to a hot fury. "_You're_ behind this? I thought you were for real." Sheila's rough, lined face revealed nothing but furious confusion and Raphael cracked his knuckles slowly. "That's disgusting. _This_ is your cover up? You oughta be ashamed."

"Slow down, Sherlock," Amber was leaning up against a filing cabinet, lighting a cigarette. "Sheila's got nothing to do with it. "

"To do with what?" The woman bit, spittle bursting through the chip in her front tooth with the savagery of her words. "Just who do you think you are, Amber? Bringing that – that – criminal in here - " Raphael bridled at that, shoulders thrown back. "Abusing Megan's trust! If I'd known she'd brought _you_ in I would've kicked you straight back out again."

Amber exhaled, a billow of smoke rising to the ceiling. "Gee, that's real nice, Sheila. Room for some, but not all, huh?"

"No different than you and Thistleways!" Sheila spat, kicking against the wall with a booted ankle.

"Bullshit." Amber's temper was roused and she took a step towards the older woman before Raphael, who'd watched the exchange silently, stepped up.

"Whoah. Cut it out ladies. This ain't about your personal vendettas." And turned to fix what must've been a pointed look at Amber. "Not that I knew there even was one."

Amber ignored that, taking another draw on her cigarette and gesturing with a jerk of her head to Sheila who was eyeing the telephone that sat, just beyond her reach behind Raphael, on the desk she'd abandoned. "He's right, Sheila. This isn't about you. You remember a girl named Tran, she was brought in by doofus over here – " she disregarded Raphael's indignant 'hey' " – the other night?"

Sheila did not answer, just folded her arms tight over her chest, glared at Amber, who shrugged. "I'll take that as a yes. Well, you did the usual, right, clean her up, pass her over to Pathways?"

Sheila bristled, her hair practically on edge with indignation. "You have no right to that information, Amber. What happens to our clients is confidential."

"Oh cut the crap, Sheila, you've pimped the product to every news source across the country. I know what happens – you hand them over to Pathways who either sponsor them to work within their organisation in Asia or arrange for them to get visas. Or at least, that's what they tell you they do."

Sheila had pushed herself off the wall, ready to launch another attack at Amber; but those last words halted her.

"What are you insinuating?" The words were slow, measured and she glared at Amber ferociously, though with the first tinge of uncertainty about her eyes.

Amber ignored her, enjoying the position of power she held, with Raphael shadowing the desk and the window, she obstructing the door that she now leaned back against, crossing her ankles over the other, folding her arms.

"Tran managed to escape from Pathways. She sought me out. Suggestive, isn't it?"

Sheila scowled as Amber allowed the barest flicker of a smirk to idle up one side of her mouth. "It doesn't prove anything."

"She never wanted to come here in the first place. She thought my buddy here was picking her up for a date."

"She's never known any other sort of life – "

"That doesn't mean she's not happy!"

"She should have other opportunities!"

"She shouldn't be forced into them! You and this bullshit organization screaming into every mouthpiece you can get with this utter bullshit about how every client is a rape, how you lose your soul, become entirely degraded – who do you think you are, preaching that shit?

"You don't know the first thing about me – "

"I know you're making it worse for us! We're trying to move towards decriminalisation – "

"The entire industry should be shut down!" The two women had given up all pretence at the terse civility they'd maintained and were openly screaming at each other in the small, dusty room. Raphael stood back, looking from one to the other, seeming uncertain as to what he should do; whether to intervene or let things play out, uncomfortable with an argument he wasn't a part of.

"That's ridiculous! What do you base that on? Some fucking cliché stereotype of a pimped out drug addicted fifteen year old getting beaten up, molested by her Daddy?" Amber's voice was scathing, flinging her arms out and lowering her head towards Sheila in an aggressive stance. "Just trying to make it through each day through the horrendous experience of having a dozen different dicks in her and – "

"_That was my life!_" Sheila's shriek verged on hysteria, the force of it propelling her across the room to shove violently at Amber, knocking her backwards into the door. Both Amber and Raphael were stunned into silence, Raphael's hand arrested mid-air as he'd reached out to pull Sheila back, Amber slumped against the door, shoulders hunched to her ears, eyes wide and staring. Sheila breathed heavily, her hands balled into fists, furious and red-faced, her breath echoing in the still air of the room.

Raphael turned to look at Amber, waiting for her to speak, to come up with some venomous retort. She said nothing.

Her breath still coming in ferocious gasps, Sheila broke the silence. "Some of us have had that life. Many of us. You think I'm here by accident? You don't know anything. I'm here to make sure no other woman ever goes through what I did." Her voice cracked on the last few words and she turned away furiously from them both, clenching her fists tighter, her shoulders shuddering over with the effort to restrain her emotion.

"That still doesn't make you right." Amber's voice was ice-cold, her eyes pitiless. Sheila exhaled a great breath and turned around to return steadily:

"Nor you." Their glared the other down in the uneasy standoff, then Sheila continued: "Don't you think those who've had that experience deserve something else? That they should have someone to support them in that?"

"You tell them there's something wrong with them! There isn't – and it's not something inherently wrong with the industry either. It's bullshit." Amber sounded halfway between exasperation and indignation. Sheila composed her features.

"I don't agree with you."

Raphael was looking at the woman with a new sympathy that couldn't be seen beneath the protective cover of the helmet, the tenseness of his body softening. Tentatively, holding his hand out in a gesture of comfort, he took a step towards her, readying himself to speak. Her head whipped around to him, lines deepening as her face contorted.

"Don't lay a hand on me!" she spat and he backed off, holding his hands up.

"I wasn't goin' to." He spoke softly, recognising the pain in the woman's eyes, seeing her chopped off hairstyle and loose, baggy clothes differently. He suddenly wished for some of Leonardo's grace, or Michelangelo's sensitivity, either of them would have something to say here or some sort of gesture that would indicate respect, compassion. He had nothing. Feeling awkward and blundering, he launched into an explanation of why they were there. "Look, there isn't any easy way to tell ya this. I dunno how else to – the thing is – " the words blurted themselves out in desperation " – Pathways is just a front. They're selling the women into marriages." His face grew hot, and he felt tension in his muscles with the desire to hit something, to pummel the clumsiness out of himself as Sheila's brows knitted together and she processed what he had said, frowning deeply.

Amber spoke up then, pushing herself off the door and tugging at the straps of her dress. "They've been lying to you. I guess you would've checked them out so they must have a pretty elaborate and professional looking scam going, but they're not a charity organization. They took Tran to a place by the docks, largely industrial area, quiet and far away from anything. They told her she was going to be married to some guy in England and she was to behave herself and do what she was told. Tran's a smart girl, she asked how much she would get for it. In her words, they laughed in her face, spat in her hair and shoved her in a room with a dozen other frightened women sent to them from you lot. "

Sheila had paced backwards until she was up against the stack of filing cabinets; they moved slightly, grating against each other as she hit them, one hand rising up to her breast.

"You're lying," she whispered and Amber continued, reaching down into her boot for her packet of cigarettes, long hair obscuring her face from Raphael's glance.

"Later on, one of the girls who spoke English – which they didn't realise – overheard them discussing Tran's future journey. According to one guy the buyer she's being sent to has already "been through" two or three brides. The other fellow asked if that was an issue for Pathways. To which he was told that repeat business was good and Pathways wasn't responsible for cleaning up any mess a client made." Amber paused, somewhat maliciously Raphael felt, to let Sheila absorb that information, then continued. "She told the other girls, and Tran, who understandably was even more concerned. Not quite her idea of what being rescued meant." She finished unnecessarily.

Sheila had sunk to her haunches on the carpet, her face acquiring a drawn and round-eyed visage, staring dumbly ahead.

"You're lying." She repeated softly. Amber stood above her, one hand crossed over her waist, the other lifting a lit cigarette to her lips.

"I'm not."

"How did Tran escape then?" Sheila blurted this out, leaping upon the incongruity desperately. Amber glanced across at Raphael who could not help but turn away, hand reaching out to fiercely grip the back of the chair at the desk so hard the wood creaked. Amber swallowed, took another draw.

"The girls are all taken for a 'test drive' before being sent to their future hubbies. Tran feigned willingness and they got lax with the security. She squeezed out the bathroom window after taking a chomp on one guy's cock, ran barefoot across a yard littered with broken glass and cracked cement and hid below a dock, in filthy cold water for three hours until they moved the search elsewhere. Told ya she's a smart girl. " Amber sucked back on her cigarette, drawing in over half of its smoking length in one hit. Raphael turned his body entirely to the chair, his other hand joining the one that gripped it, head bent down. Sheila continued to slump on the floor, hands covering her face, the fingertips compulsively rubbing the corners of her eyes, her face white and red and horror-struck. The tension was a taut thread between them all, none of them quite daring to break it. Raphael was aware of a growing rumble in his gut, a slowly boiling sensation that was rising steadily upwards; that they couldn't waste any more time, that she had to give them the information so that he could go and _end this_. Because he suddenly wasn't sure how much longer he could hold on. Finally, just as he thought he was going to hurl the chair across the room, Sheila spoke again.

"I don't believe you."

And he turned on her, snapping before Amber could say anything.

"You want to take that risk?"

Sheila raised her eyes to him, and he saw with a lurch they were wet. He was locked in her gaze and Amber took the opportunity to speak.

"I don't think this was originally in Project Dignity's mission statement, was it?"

"Shuttup Amber," he didn't take his eyes from Sheila, but could feel Amber start backwards, hear her snort, grind her cigarette out on the carpet.

He took a step to Sheila and held out his hand to her. She stared at it blankly for a long moment and then took it and he pulled her to her feet, then squeezed her hand in his.

"Tell me where to find them," he said, "And I'll take care of it."

His iron voice was a promise, its implication clear. And after a short pause, she told him.


	6. Chapter 6

**CHAPTER SIX**

**XV**

Pathways' suite of offices were located in upper Manhattan, housed on the fifteenth floor of a tall, glittering skyscraper that burned with lights.

I surveyed the building from a rooftop opposite, the need to figure out a way of getting in taking my mind off the scene that had taken place barely twenty minutes before on the other side of town.

The second that lady had given up the address, I was outta there, not pausing even to look at Amber before I did, not wanting to see the haunted look in that lady's eyes another second.

I hated that we'd had to go there, that Tran didn't know the city or how to get back to where she'd escaped from.

I'd put as much distance between us as quickly as I could, moving frenetically over the rooftops at a pace to rival Mikey's, the weight of the suit tugging me just slightly every jump I took, sweating from every pore until the suit felt like a sauna but not stopping, not pausing, not until I reached the address.

I'd moved around the rooftops until I'd located their offices, a regular looking arrangement of cubicles, empty and dark for the night, leading into a corner office, closed off from the rest with high walls and a heavy door. I could see the furniture inside it was expensive – the huge oak desk and the wide, heavy leather chair for all the world like some kinda throne, walls lined with framed documents and a set of shelves with awards dotted out along them – some of them humanitarian awards.

I grit my teeth so hard my jaw ached.

When Amber took me there, I didn't know the head of Dignity woulda had nothing to do with it all. All Tran knew was they'd handed her over to this mob. Amber never mentioned she knew that lady – Sheila – knew that she would be ignorant. I'd been itching to go, to get my hands on whoever was at the centre of it. I didn't figure I'd need Amber to learn what I needed to know. But she'd insisted, that she'd know where to find the information, that she'd be let in without a fuss.

I could see so clearly into that big, pretty office because the lights in there were still on. And at the big desk, in his throne, sat my target, back to me. I could see the top of his greying hair above the back of the chair. See that on his desk sat framed photographs of smiling kids. And I felt my muscles tense, fuelled with the kind of cold, burning fury that meant whatever came next would be over with quickly.

I'd have to enter through the roof. The glass would be too thick to break once I got over there. Unless I used explosives. Or unless…

I cocked my head, judging the distance with a narrowed eye. With the suit on I weighed about two hundred, two-ten. I reckoned it would be enough.

If I'd known Sheila had nothing to do with it I coulda gone back to the offices after she'd gone for the night, found the info then – Amber coulda helped… but then, that was it, wasn't it. Amber had wanted Sheila to be there. She'd wanted Sheila to know.

I wondered if Sheila would ever get a decent night's sleep again.

I'd backed up on the rooftop, shook my shoulders and arms out, tensed them. Then I ran.

I hurtled over the edge of the rooftop, every ounce of power in me summoned up in the run, sending me flying over the illuminated street, the wind screaming around the helmet. I pulled my knees up to my chest, wrapped my arms around them, kept my body on a straight trajectory so as not to lessen the impact and braced myself as the glass wall rushed over to meet me.

The sound of the glass bursting was ferocious, though it resisted just enough to slow my path down, meaning I fortunately didn't go flying into the wall the other side of the office, but landed, rolled and came up on one knee as shards of glass rained down all around me. The thick leather and metal of the suit protected me though the edges of the glass still felt sharp as they made contact. I crouched for a moment to make sure I wasn't going to sway as I stood up, and then I turned on my quarry.

He hadn't had time to move before the glass had shattered all around him, capable of doing nothing but throwing his arms up over his head and himself beneath his desk, no doubt thinking Armageddon had stopped in for a social call. His desk was scattered with pieces of glass, large and small, his carpet patterned in it, crunching under my feet as I moved towards the desk, framed now by a jagged-edged hole that let in the night wind, furious and screeching even at just fifteen stories up.

I reached down over the desk, grabbed him by his collar, unable to help a satisfied grin at the terrified shriek I heard then, hauled him up and onto the glass-strewn surface, his body sweeping against the scattered fragments so that they tinkled and chinked against each other.

He sputtered, hands waving uselessly at the air as I bent over him. He hadn't managed to escape the glass entirely. A bloody cut intersected his forehead, and other smaller ones decorated his cheeks, ears, neck and hands. The blood ran down into his eyes, no doubt blurring his vision, and I shoved a thumb forward to wipe it away, he whimpering and struggling beneath me, helpless and useless.

"You got somethin' to tell me," I snarled at him, bending over into his face, "and I don't wanna wait."

**XVI**

"You will sever your ties with Project Dignity. Or I'll be back. And you won't survive the next time."

Those were the words I'd left him with once he'd stopped blubbering long enough to give me the docks address. He'd pissed himself once he'd registered enough to focus on me, see who it was who'd exploded into his office, upheaved his comfortable life. I knew that would make Amber laugh. I just found it perplexing, to connect this cowardice with the horror he enacted on defenceless women.

When I knew that he'd heard those words, I made him incapable of going for help, for calling ahead and warning his cronies, of doing anything but lying on the floor on a bed of glass, moaning and waiting for his secretary to arrive in the morning. Let him figure out a way of explaining it. I was fairly confident the name Nightwatcher wouldn't come into things.

Then I'd come down to the docks.

It looked like just a warehouse from the outside but when I got up to the roof, looking in through the skylight there, I'd seen that half the interior had been built into rooms with partitions, the other half loaded up with crates, huge crates, perhaps ten by six. Big enough to fit a person inside it with room left over, for easy loading onto the ships that would wait nearby.

The men I saw threading their way through the crates, coming in or out of the doorway that led into the suite of rooms, or moving up towards the office that overlooked the whole space were all packing heat and I opted not for the explosive entrance this time, instead edging the skylight open and easing silently in.

I didn't want to take any of them out from a distance, or from behind, even though it woulda made things easier. I wanted them to see it coming.

The first guy didn't have time to draw his gun, but he yelped in surprise as my fist landed in his gut before I knocked him out and that alerted the others. The warehouse rang with the cocking of chambers and I felt a grin contort my face beneath the helmet as I readied myself for the battle ahead.

The _manriki_ disarmed one of them, and I felt the pop of another's elbow as I grabbed his gun arm and twisted it. A bullet went whistling past my head, singeing the helmet and I ducked low and barrelled forward as a round of shots rang out, delayed just long enough by the shock of two of their pals whimpering on the ground so that I was ahead of them. A kick landed in one jaw, a fist in another, two automatics were plucked from their moaning holders' fingertips and tossed away into the shadows amongst the crates. The last guy opted to run but the _manriki_ coiled around his ankle and hauled him back to me. I spun him onto his back, bringing me face to face with the barrel of his gun and I threw myself back onto my hands, kicking the weapon so that it went spinning into the air, releasing a shot as it did so which buried itself in the partition leading into the built-in rooms.

The force of the _manriki_ had broken one guy's hand, I'd broken the arm of another, but I was hardly through yet.

Tran's tear-stained face and Sheila's stricken, broken gaze played through my mind as I laid into them, all calculation gone as I gave vent to my anger, allowed it to flood, un-dammed into every muscle and limb, transforming me from a fighter, from a vigilante into something made only of fury and vengeance, blind and raging down onto their bodies which cracked and popped beneath the force. Hired guns, nothing more, made immortal by the weapons they carried, unable to believe anyone capable of overcoming them so long as they had those guns.

But not just that, not nothing more. I thought of the women who lay hidden in the rooms beyond me, what these men had done to them. Then Amber's face rose up in my vision, clouded with the bruises rained on her by some creep like these bastards. As I brutalised them, hard muscle pounded into soft flesh beneath me, I felt a great roar rising up from my gut, burning my throat as it came, filling my ears with its sound.

Then I realised they were no longer getting up, no longer moving. Five broken bodies lay crumpled around me in the gloom, bloody and still and I was in their centre, hearing my heart hammer, feeling my breath come in furious gasps. Slowly I came back to myself, that strange focused numbness retreating to where I could feel the throb in one knee, the smarting across my knuckles, the sweat trickling hot down my legs, the back of my neck to underneath my shell.

I guessed at least one of them wasn't breathing. Maybe more than one. Maybe all of them. I didn't care.

My focus came back to me and I moved to the partitioned rooms, still strung out enough to yank the door open a little too hard, still panting.

There was a corridor, splitting the suite into two sides. A couple of doors were open, revealing nothing more than filing cabinets and more crates, some beds and a bathroom. I noticed the bathroom was on the side that was built against the wall of the warehouse, a window above the sink. Maybe the bathroom Tran had escaped out of. Then I came to a door that was bolted and padlocked.

I stopped for a moment and leant on it, shutting my eyes and breathing deep, waiting for my pulse to calm. Remembering what Amber had said back at Mae's joint. Reminding myself the enemy was taken care of.

Then I backed up, drew all my energy together, and kicked the door in, cold and calculated.

The women within, sitting huddled together on the rows of bunk beds, did not scream or cower when I entered. They sat there, maybe eight of them, arms around each other, staring at me with wide eyes, silent and wary. I stayed near the doorway, surveying them. The silence, the weight of their still expectation, hung heavy over me.

Amber had confronted me as we rode the elevator down from Mae's. Had pulled off my helmet and stepped up close to me, her eyes fervent on mine. "No cops."

The thick leather of the suit, the bone of my plastron and I could still feel her body pressed against mine, the flare in her eyes as she'd said it, her grip on my shoulders. "It'll just make more trouble for them. They'll be deported. No cops."

Without the cops, Pathways would go unpunished. These girls would disappear into the city, not officially existing. They'd go back to the people they had contracts with – to Mae.

I didn't know what the right thing to do was.

I felt my shoulders sag. They must've seen it because then one of them stood up and took a step forward, her waist-length black hair tangled, her face a smooth oval mask expresisonless except for her eyes, huge and alert.

"Can we go?" Her English was soft and accented. I lifted my head to look at her again, to hold her eyes, knowing as I did she couldn't see mine and that it wouldn't matter if she could. She wasn't asking a question so much as telling me what they wanted.

So I stepped back.

She spoke to them softly in Thai, and after a moment of hesitation, they begun to collect themselves to leave, standing up, clutching hands, moving towards the door together. They filed out, still silent and cautious, looking carefully up and down the corridor as they moved, picking up speed as the silence of the warehouse impressed itself upon them. I leant up against the wall as they passed, one or two daring a glance at me and hurrying away; I heard them gasp and exchange a few frantic words as they came upon the bodies of their captors, but they did not stop or slow down, but continued to quicken until finally I could hear their feet in a pattering run making for the exit.

I waited a while, long enough to give them the chance to get away from the building.

Then I left.

**XVII**

Amber was waiting for me on our rooftop, a slim silhouette against the dark blue of the sky, patterned with stormy clouds dimly illuminated by the glare of the city. I came up in line with her and we stood in silence, the river stretched out in front of us and glittering dully.

I pulled the helmet off and stood there with it in my hands, looking down at it. Seeing where the bullet had carved a small dent in it, one more war wound to add to its collection. I remembered how she'd leapt forward and lifted it up in the elevator, how I'd been enraged by that broach, my first impulse to throw her back. And I looked up at her, to the fading bruise on her cheek, barely visible now beneath the heavy cluster of freckles in this dim light.

She darted a look at me, her face savage with its query.

"No cops." I admitted grudgingly and she jerked her head quickly. I guess that was her thank you.

The silence grew and made me uncomfortable. It was not the easy silence we had sat in before. This one simmered with resentment, hers as keen as one of Leo's blades and mine steadily sharpening to match it.

"Did you haveta do that?" I grumbled and she threw another look at me, eyes bright and questioning. I sniffed and looked back out to the river, wondering briefly which way those girls had gone. "What you did to Sheila."

"She had to know." Amber's voice was calm and assured and it got me going.

"Not that way." I snapped, rounding to face her. Something passed over her eyes, something broken, but she recovered quickly and glared at me steadily, saying nothing.

Then she broke the stand-off, stepping back and pulling her knapsack around to fumble in it for her cigarettes, sighing.

"Mae and Tran said to say thank you." She said, not looking at me and my own sigh was like a hiss through my teeth. "Do you want a drink?"

I thought her voice shook. I accepted the bottle and took a slug, the gin harsh on my dry throat. I really needed water.

When she took the bottle back I caught sight again of the bruise patterning her breast bone, disappearing below her dress and in a fit of frustration I stepped forward, grasping her arm and pulling her towards me.

"Let me see."

"No." She wrestled against my grip. "I told you to just leave it. Now leave it." Her voice rose, echoing in the quiet around us and abruptly I let her go so she stumbled backwards.

"Then tell me what happened." I clenched my fists, ground my heels into the rooftop and wished that it never happened like this, that there were problems I couldn't solve with my fists.

She'd lit her cigarette and now blew a cloud of smoke out furiously, centring a vicious glare at me. "What happened? What happened is that I hooked up with that pretty boy I told you about, what happened is we spent an afternoon shooting up all the smack he had in the house, what happened is his boyfriend came home and got pissed off there was nothing left and kicked the shit out of both of us. Okay?"

I couldn't say anything, my mind wrestling with this information, struggling around its unexpectedness, feeling my eyes bug at her. She snorted, turned halfway away from me, raising her cigarette to her mouth.

"Like I said, it's not always the way it looks. "

And slowly it registered that she did know who it was, and where they were and that if she would tell me then I could –

So why didn't she tell me?

She took in a shaking breath and rounded on me.

"Whose side are you on?" Her voice wavered, her half-shadowed face contorted with emotion. I gaped at the question, my thought path broken.

"What?"

"Whose side are you on?" She repeated, her brows creasing together as she stared at me. "Mine or Sheila's?"

She couldn't have surprised me more if she'd pulled a gun on me. We stood together on the rooftop, the summer breeze chill at this height, the semi-darkness falling in heavy shadows between us. "Wh-why are ya askin' me this?" I lifted my palms to her, one foot stepping back defensively, scraping against the cracked cement.

"I just wanna know." She persisted, lifting her chin. "Who you agree with."

In the silence that followed the darkness seemed to grow heavier, the dim city sounds retreating further. I gaped at her and she stared at me, jaw clenched and for maybe the first time in my life I found myself wondering why it had to come down to this all the damn time – always us and them. The cigarette in her hand burned steadily away, now more a long cylinder of ash. As I met the steel in her eyes I found my words carefully.

"You're the one I'm gonna stand by." I said it softly but she recoiled anyway. It wasn't enough.

"That's not an answer." She snapped and her eyes got wet.

I shrugged, a coiling sickness in my gut, hating myself and resenting her for forcing it.

"That's all I got for ya right now." It ached to admit it. I wanted to touch her and I wanted to fight. I wanted to reassure her but I didn't want to lie. She'd know if I did, anyway.

Then her face hardened again, settling into a disturbing stillness, eyes drying instantly and cold and mean on me.

"Okay, whatever, " she drawled, sucking in the last lungful of nicotine her cigarette held, the harshness of the roach making her cough painfully. She threw the butt down and pushed her hair back. "See ya 'round. I gotta go stick a needle in my arm."

It was cruel and unnecessary. But I said nothing as she whirled around and headed for the fire escape, her boots slapping the pavement in a way that betrayed her anger. I turned away from her and moved to the edge of the rooftop, looking out across the streets that wound their way down to the riverside, listening to the clang of the ladder as she clambered down, out of sight and without another word.

Then I pulled the helmet back on. The night was still young, after all.

**End**


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